ma 

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HEROES    OF 
SURGENCY 


PREI 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


HEROES  OF  INSURGENCY 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 


HEROES  OF 
INSURGENCY 

By     THOMAS      DREIER 


BOSTON 

HUMAN    LIFE    PUBLISHING    COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1910 
By  HUMAN  LIFE  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 


THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS,  CAMBRIDGE,  U.S.A. 


FOREWORD 

IN  offering  this  book  to  the  public  the 
publishers  have  made  no  attempt  to 
cover  the  field  of  Insurgency  or  Progres- 
sive Republicanism,  for  we  do  not  fail 
to  appreciate  that  the  movement  is  one 
which  has  enthusiastic  leaders  and  ad- 
herents in  practically  every  state  in  the 
Union.  In  fact,  as  this  book  goes  to 
press,  reports  are  coming  in  from  all 
sections  of  the  country  indicating  the 
success  of  the  cause  in  states  little  sus- 
pected of  insurgency,  and  every  day 
brings  to  our  attention  some  new  cham- 
pion who  is  fighting  for  popular  rights. 

The   one   aim   of   the   publishers    has 
been  to  present  short,  gripping  life  stories 
of  the  leaders  of  insurgency  in  the  recent 
iii 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

sessions  of  Congress.  These  eight  men 
whose  stories  are  told  in  the  following 
pages  were  the  most  conspicuous  in  the 
legislative  battles  of  the  last  session. 

In  their  work  they  have  been  abundantly 
aided  by  many  others  in  Congress  whose 
parts  were  somewhat  less  conspicuous, 
and  they  have  been  ably  assisted  by  many 
who  have  been  fighting  for  the  cause  on 
state  issues  rather  than  national  ones. 

That  these  men  have  had  much  to  do 
with  forming  the  public  opinion  of  to-day 
is  true,  but  it  is  equally  true  that  with- 
out the  moral  and  voting  support  of  the 
people  back  of  them  they  of  themselves 
could  have  accomplished  nothing.  These 
men  saw  a  need  and  hastened  to  supply 
it.  That  they  have  succeeded  is  proved 
by  their  careers  from  then  up  to  now. 

Some  of  these  heroes  have  been  fight- 
ing for  years  for  true  representative 
iv 


FOREWORD 

government.  They  have  suffered  pov- 
erty, have  been  misunderstood,  have 
been  called  enemies  of  the  established 
order.  But  always  they  have  fought  for 
the  right  as  they  understood  it.  That 
their  vision  was  broad  has  been  proved 
by  results.  They  have  been  justified  in 
their  belief  that  the  American  citizen 
loves  squareness  and  honesty.  That 
they  have  held  firmly  to  this  belief,  in 
spite  of  the  years  of  inappreciation,  com- 
pels one  to  think  the  more  of  them. 

The  study  of  these  brief  biographies 
gives  reasons  why  these  men  may  be 
called  "  Heroes  of  Insurgency."  Noth- 
ing that  can  be  said  here  will  add 
strength  to  the  plain  stories  of  their 
lives.  The  book  is  given  out  with  the 
hope  that  these  men  may  be  helped  to 
materialize  more  of  their  dreams  which 
make  for  truer  democracy,  and  that 
y 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

others  may  be  encouraged  to  engage  in 
the  fight  that  is  no  more  than  started. 
To  the  young  men  of  America  is  the 
book  especially  dedicated.  In  the  his- 
tories of  these  men  they  will  find  the 
true  secret  of  political  as  well  as  any 
other  kind  of  success  to  be  real  manhood, 
unswerving  honesty,  and  patient  devotion 
to  an  ideal. 

GEORGE  RUSSELL  STRATTON. 


yi 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE n 

ALBERT  BAIRD  CUMMINS 35 

GEORGE  WILLIAM  NORRIS 53 

JOSEPH  LITTLE  BRISTOW 67 

JONATHAN  PRENTISS  DOLLIVER        ...  85 

ALBERT  J.  BEVERIDGE 103 

VICTOR  MURDOCK 123 

MILES  POINDEXTER 139 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Robert  M.  LaFollette Frontispiece 

FACING    PAGE 

Albert  Baird  Cummins 36 

George  William  Norris 54 

Joseph  Little  Bristow 68 

Jonathan  Prentiss  Dolliver 86 

Albert  J.  Beveridge 104 

Victor  Murdock 1 24 

Miles  Poindexter 140 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 


HEROES  OF  INSURGENCY 

ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

'TVHE  most  spectacular,  dramatic,  and 
-*-  Napoleonic  of  the  leaders  of  insur- 
gency is  Senator  Robert  Marion  LaFol- 
le.tte,  the  dynamic  fighter  against  political 
corruption,  whose  work  in  Wisconsin  at- 
tracted and  held  the  attention  of  the 
nation. 

For  thirty  years  his  fighting  blood  has 
been  coursing  through  his  veins  under  the; 
urge  of  his  desire  to  make  popular  gov- 
ernment materialize  into  something  more 
substantial  than  a  name. 

He  was  born  in  Primrose,  an  insignif- 
icant little  town  in  Wisconsin,  on  June 
J4>  ^55-  The  wolves  of  poverty  continu- 


HEROES    OF   INSURGENCY 

ously  camped  before  the  LaFollette  door. 
His  father  died  when  Robert  was  a  young- 
ster, and  the  care  of  the  family  was  his 
first  great  task.  He  fought  against  pov- 
erty as  he  later  fought  against  the  polit- 
ical machine  —  winning  his  way  forward 
because  of  the  gifts  bestowed  upon  him 
by  his  French-Huguenot  and  Scotch-Irish 
ancestors. 

In  the  face  of  great  obstacles  he  worked 
his  way  through  Wisconsin  University, 
distinguished  himself  and  his  college  by 
the  use  of  his  oratorical  gifts,  impressed 
himself  upon  his  fellows  as  a  man  of 
tremendous  energy,  of  unswerving  deter- 
mination, of  concentration  that  held  him 
to  his  tasks  until  completed,  and  time  after 
time  demonstrated  his  mastership  in  a 
fight  where  knowledge  and  fire  were 
needed. 

He  graduated  in  1879,  taking  the  LL.D. 
14 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

degree  two  years  later.  All  this  time  he 
was  paying  his  own  way  and  helping  in 
the  support  of  his  family.  It  is  said  that 
he  studied  night  and  day  at  one  period 
and  took  his  law  examinations  in  sixteen 
weeks  —  a  feat  that  has  seldom  been 
equaled. 

He  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1880. 
That  was  his  real  start  as  a  public  ser- 
vant. He  proved  himself  a  brilliant  trial 
lawyer.  His  fire,  his  knowledge,  his  abil- 
ity—  the  innate  bigness  of  the  man  — 
manifested  themselves,  and  his  popularity 
and  his  business  slowly  but  steadily^ 
increased. 

LaFollette  never  had  the  ability  to  hide 
himself.  He  could  no  more  conceal  his 
real  worth  than  he  could  turn  aside  a  law 
of  nature.  Indeed,  it  would  have  been 
nothing  less  than  the  breaking  of  a  natu- 
ral law  had  he  been  able  to  remain  in  ob- 
15 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

scurity.  As  cream  inevitably  rises  to  the 
top  of  the  milk,  R.  M.  LaFollette,  attor- 
ney, rose  and  attracted  the  attention  of 
the  community. 

"  He  would  make  a  fine  district  attor- 
ney," said  some. 

The  political  bosses,  hearing  clearly  the 
whisper,  merely  smiled.  They  were  the 
ones  who  chose  officials,  and  they  knew, 
that  this  poor  youth,  equipped  as  he  was 
with  honesty  and  brilliancy,  when  only 
brilliancy  as  a  machine  cog  was  required, 
would  not  do. 

But  the  opposition  of  the  bosses  was 
just  the  spur  young  LaFollette  needed. 
All  the  French-Huguenot  and  Scotch- 
Irish  blood  began  to  boil.  It  was  and  is 
a  terrible  combination  —  that  fighting 
blood  of  his.  It  made  him  radiate  even 
more  than  usual,  and  more  attention  was 
called  to  him.  Knowing  something  of  the 
16 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

political  corruption  in  his  state,  and  more 
of  the  corruption  of  the  machine  politi- 
cians in  his  own  county,  LaFollette  hun- 
gered for  the  fray. 

He  was  without  money;  the  machine 
was  backed  by  railroads,  banks,  electric 
roads,  liquor  interests,  bawdy  houses,  and 
they  owned,  body  and  soul,  those  instru- 
ments commonly  called  molders  of  public 
opinion  —  the  newspapers.  He  was  with- 
out an  organization;  the  machine  was 
without  a  flaw  —  it  was  all  that  money 
and  great  brains  purchasable  by  power 
and  pelf  could  make.  The  machine 
reached  deep  into  the  political  and  busi- 
ness depths  and  also  far  upward.  It 
seemed  idiotic,  asinine,  foolhardy  for  this 
lone  youngster  to  attempt  to  oppose  it. 
The  wise  ones  came  to  him  and  pointed 
out  the  gravestones  that  marked  the  polit- 
ical graves  of  those  who  had  failed  to  bow 
17 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

supinely  to  the  superior  power  of  the 
machine. 

But  all  that  had  as  little  effect  on  La- 
Follette  as  the  summer  zephyrs  have  upon 
the  granite  of  the  eternal  hills.  The  more 
opposition  there  was  the  better  he  liked 
it.  Like  Luther,  he  would  go  on  if  all  the 
shingles  on  all  the  housetops  were  machine 
devils  organized  to  bring  about  his  defeat. 

The  machine,  however,  did  not  take  him 
seriously.  The  boss  gave  a  few  orders 
and  forgot  the  incident.  Confidence 
reigned  in  the  machine  camp.  Victories 
had  come  into  that  camp  for  many  years. 

But  LaFollette  did  not  forget.  He,  as 
he  has  ever  done  since,  spent  his  time 
working.  His  knowledge  of  the  great 
reform  movements  of  history  stood  him 
in  good  stead.  He  knew  that  all  strength 
comes  from  the  people  —  either  by  active 
or  passive  consent.  So  he  went  direct  to 
18 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

the  people.  He  talked  to  the  people  in 
schoolhouses,  in  their  homes,  on  the  road- 
ways, on  their  farms,  in  their  stores  and 
factories  and  offices  —  always  he  went 
direct. 

He  was  district  attorney  of  Dane 
County,  Wisconsin,  from  1880  until  1884. 

Then  came  talk  of  Congress.  That  was 
a  big  task  under  machine  opposition. 
Five  counties  made  the  district.  Upon 
one  only  could  LaFollette  count.  But  he 
pursued  the  same  tactics  that  had  worn 
him  his  district  attorneyship.  He  went  to 
the  people.  He  riddled  the  record  of  the 
machine  with  verbal  grapeshot.  His 
earnestness,  his  honesty,  his  ability  whicH 
had  been  demonstrated  in  his  county  field, 
his  clean  record,  his  dramatic  defiance  of 
arrogant  bossism,  his  direct  appeal  to  the 
people  for  justice  —  all  these  things  won 
him  vote  after  vote,  and,  when  the  con- 
19 


HEROES    OF   INSURGENCY 

test  was  over,  LaFollette  sat  perched  upon 
the  prostrate  composite  personality  of 
bossism.  He  remained  a  member  of  Con- 
gress from  the  Third  Wisconsin  District 
from  1885  until  1891.  As  a  member  of  the 
Ways  and  Means  Committee,  he  took  a 
prominent  part  in  framing  the  McKinley 
Bill.  His  greatest  work,  however,  was 
his  study  of  the  machinery  of  the  na- 
tional government,  which  was  of  such 
material  value  to  him  in  his  later  state 
campaigns  and  in  his  present  work  in  the 
Senate. 

The  next  thing  that  happened  was  a 
Democratic  victory.  This  came  in  1890, 
and  LaFollette  found  himself,  with  the 
rest  of  the  Republicans,  out  in  the  dreary 
cold.  His  little  work  in  Congress  in  pre- 
venting the  robbery  of  the  Indians  on  the 
Menominee  reservation  by  the  lumber 
barons,  his  ability  as  shown  in  his  work 
20 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

on  the  McKinley  Bill,  his  eloquence  — 
nothing  availed.  It  was  a  Democratic 
landslide  that  swept  the  Republicans  out 
of  power  for  three  years. 

Having  fought  and  whipped  the  ma- 
chine in  the  district  attorneyship  matter, 
and  having  three  times  defeated  it  in  the 
congressional  affair,  LaFollette  was  look- 
ing for  a  bigger  victory.  He  aspired  to 
the  governorship. 

For  twenty  years  the  railroads  had  held 
the  state  in  their  powerful  and  corrupting 
grip.  It  was  once  a  popular  belief  that 
the  state  capitol  building  had  been  built 
facing  the  Northwestern  depot  just  to 
remind  the  legislators  of  the  true  source 
of  power. 

It  was  in  1896  that  he  offered  himself 

as  a  candidate.    Before  the  convention  he 

had  a  clear  majority  of  votes.     But  the 

machine  opened  its  mint,  and  enough  votes 

21 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

were  "  influenced  "  to  defeat  the  doughty 
fighter.  In  1898  he  had  a  still  larger 
majority,  but  again  the  trusty  agents  of 
the  machine  spent  their  time  during  the 
night  to  the  best  interests  of  their  mas- 
ters. A  third  time  came  LaFollette.  He 
would  not  down.  Always  he  had  been  edu- 
cating the  people  of  the  state.  They  had 
awakened  in  response  to  his  fervent  plead- 
ings. He  had  all  but  one  hundred  and 
sixty  of  eleven  hundred  delegates  pledged 
to  support  him.  Market-place  tactics  could 
not  overcome  this  lead.  The  machine  sur- 
rendered with  hypocritical  smiles. 

LaFollette,  in  his  innocence,  believed 
the  promises  of  the  machine  men  that 
they  would  help  him  test  his  proposed 
reforms.  But  he  discovered  that  his  posi- 
tion of  Governor  enabled  him  to  accom- 
plish practically  nothing  without  a  friendly 
Legislature.  He  discovered  also  that  while 

22 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

the  machine  men  were  smiling  at  him  and 
gladdening  him  with  offers  of  assistance, 
the  trusty  agents  were  packing  the  Legis- 
lature with  machine  legislators.  That 
Legislature  defeated  all  his  reforms.  Two 
years  later,  after  almost  heart-breaking 
work,  he  secured  a  friendly  Legislature 
and  the  power  of  the  machine  was  broken. 
Under  LaFollette's  leadership  taxes 
were  equalized,  the  railroads  were  com- 
pelled to  pay  in  more  than  seven  hundred 
thousand  dollars  more  each  year,  a  state- 
wide primary  election  law  was  secured 
which  forever  put  an  end  to  convention- 
hall  purchasing  of  votes,  the  railroad 
commission  was  organized,  and  the  people 
began  to  get  justice  in  the  matter  of  rail- 
way rates  and  railway  service,  privilege 
lost  its  dictatorial  power,  and  Wisconsin 
became  known  as  the  state  wherein  the 
people  ruled. 

23 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

How  bitter  was  the  feeling  between  the 
Stalwarts  (the  machine  party)  and  the 
Half-Breeds  (the  reform  party)  only 
those  who  were  in  the  state  at  the  time 
can  realize.  Families  were  split  in  twain, 
as  had  been  done  in  the  Civil  War,  chil- 
dren were  forbidden  to  play  with  children 
whose  parents  were  in  the  opposite  camp, 
country  editors  lampooned  one  another  and 
fought  fist  fights  to  show  their  zeal,  a 
league  of  newspapers  was  secured  by  the 
moneyed  powers,  and  the  reform  element 
had  to  fight  them  by  means  of  the  pam-- 
phlet  and  the  dodger.  Brother  was  against 
brother,  father  against  son,  and  even  the 
women  shared  in  the  flow  of  love  and 
hatred  that  surged  through  the  length  and 
breadth  of  the  state.  LaFollette  to  some 
was  a  hero  to  be  worshiped.  To  others 
he  was  as  a  fiend  bent  on  destroying  the 
institutions  made  sacred  by  age  and  use. 
24 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

Every  effort  was  made  to  pick  flaws 
in  the  man's  personal  life.  Nothing  could 
be  said  against  him.  He  had  married 
Miss  Belle  Case,  of  Baraboo,  in  Decem- 
ber, 1 88 1,  and  his  family  life  was  ideal. 
His  motives  were  questioned,  his  ambition 
was  held  out  as  a  crime,  his  enemies  called 
him  a  dictator  bent  on  destroying  true 
representative  government  by  building  up 
a  personal  machine,  everything  was  done 
with  money  and  influence  to  drive  the 
people  from  him,  but  without  success. 
The  man  was  wearing  himself  out  doing 
his  work,  was  without  wealth,  was  forced 
to  go  upon  the  lecture  platform  in  order 
to  pay  his  expenses  —  there  was  nothing 
corrupt  in  him. 

He  resigned  the  governorship  in  order 
to  become  Senator  in  January,  1905,  al- 
though he  hesitated  long  before  taking 
that  step.  He  felt  that  his  work  in  Wis- 
25 


HEROES    OF   INSURGENCY 

consin  was  unfinished.  There  was  mucK 
he  felt  should  be  done.  But  the  Senate 
seemed  to  offer  an  opportunity  which 
would  enable  him  to  serve  the  greater 
number.  It  was  only  natural  that  his 
ambition  should  carry  him  upward.  Had 
he  been  a  smaller  man,  the  governorship 
would  have  satisfied  him.  But  nothing 
satisfies  LaFollette.  He  is  forever  seeing 
things  better  than  they  are.  His  power 
lies  in  his  constructive  optimism.  He  is 
called  an  agitator  bent  on  destruction. 
Nothing  is  more  untrue.  That  he  does 
destroy  is  not  to  be  denied,  but  those  who 
understand  the  man  and  his  work  know 
that  he  sees  clearly  that  which  ought  to 
be.  When  he  razes  a  tenement,  he  has 
contracts  let  for  a  skyscraper  of  steel. 

LaFollette's  welcome  to  the  Senate  was 
in  a  way  similar  to  that  which  would  be 
given  an  Orangeman  at  an  Irish  picnic 
26 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

on  St.  Patrick's  Day.  To  the  defenders 
of  corruption  his  advent  was  like  the 
appearance  of  a  red  rag  in  a  cow  pasture. 
They  determined  to  sew  him  up.  To 
their  way  of  thinking  he  was  dangerous. 
And  he  was  and  is.  His  recorti,  from 
the  time  he  was  a  poor  attorney  in  Madi- 
son down  to  to-day,  shows  him  to  have 
been  dangerous  to  all  foes  of  representa- 
tive government.  Laws  are  not  made  upon 
the  floor,  but  in  committee.  To  bury  a 
Senator  all  that  is  necessary  is  to  place 
him  upon  unimportant  committees. 

The  wise  defenders  of  privilege  thought 
this  had  been  done  to  Senator  LaFollette 
when  he  was  placed  upon  the  Committee 
on  Potomac  Flats  —  a  committee  that  has 
nothing  on  earth  to  do,  and  which,  the 
powers  permitting,  will  report  on  Dooms- 
day. So  far  the  men  of  privilege  showed 
wisdom.  But  it  was  not  until  later  that 
27 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

they  realized  their  sinfulness.  Their 
judgment  told  them  that  the  Committee 
on  Indian  Affairs  was  too  unimportant 
to  be  considered,  so  Senator  LaFollette 
was  placed  on  that  also. 

Some  one  had  blundered.  Some  one  had 
forgotten  that  in  his  congressional  days 
he  had  been  a  defender  of  the  Indians, 
and  that  he  it  was  who  had  placed  the 
tie  on  the  track  which  derailed  the  plan 
of  the  Lumber  Trust  to  steal  millions 
from  the  Menominee  tribe. 

Came  a  day  when  LaFollette  discovered 
that  the  Coal  Trust  was  after  the  Indian 
coal  lands  and  that  the  Oil  Trust  was 
after  the  oil  lands.  Then  the  privilege 
persons  awakened.  They  had  to  awaken. 
With  LaFollette  shooting  grape  and  can- 
ister into  the  plan  to  rob  the  Indians  there 
was  no  sleeping  for  the  unjust.  The  In- 
dian steal  was  killed.  After  that,  instead 
28 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

of  trying  to  give  him  so  little  to  do  as  to 
allow  him  time  for  what  they  considered 
mischief,  they  gave  him  enough  work  to 
keep  him  and  a  room  full  of  secretaries 
busy. 

With  his  lynx  eyes  boring  into  every 
plan  presented,  LaFollette  made  life  un- 
easy for  the  malefactors.  They  tried  to 
launch  floods  of  newspaper  ridicule  upon 
him.  They  tried  their  most  vitriolic  ora- 
tory upon  him.  They  visited  him  and 
his  family  with  social  ostracism.  They 
dogged  him  with  spies.  But  all  they  dis- 
covered was  that  the  man  ate  but  little 
more  than  bread  and  milk  —  on  account 
of  a  stomach  ruined  in  those  strenuous 
student  days  of  poverty  time  —  and  that 
his  honesty  was  even  suspicion-proof. 

Senator  LaFollette  introduced  a  bill  pro- 
viding for  the  physical  valuation  of  rail- 
roads. This  asked  that  the  railroads  give 
29 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

the  exact  value  of  their  properties.  Such 
a  report  would  enable  the  people  to  know 
just  how  much  of  the  freight  and  pas- 
senger income  represented  just  profit  and 
how  much  dividends  upon  watered  stock. 
Senator  Aldrich,  by  clever  jockeying  on 
the  floor  and  in  committee,  managed  to 
defeat  the  LaFollette  plan.  But  his 
amendments  proposed  as  betterments  to 
the  Hepburn  Interstate  Commerce  Bill 
have  long  since  been  advocated  by  Theo- 
dore Roosevelt  and  other  popular  cham- 
pions, and  much  is  expected  from  the  next 
Congress. 

Senator  LaFollette  is  a  small  man  with 
the  head  of  a  giant.  His  face  is  worn 
and  wrinkled.  He  shows  the  strain  under 
which  he  has  worked.  He  has  about  him 
in  repose  an  air  of  weariness.  But  in  ac- 
tion he  has  the  same  old  fire.  His  voice 
is  always  hoarse  from  much  talking,  yet 
30 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

there  is  to  be  found  in  it  a  note  of  kind- 
ness and  gentleness  that  draws  one  to  the 
man.  As  a  lecturer  he  is  always  in  de- 
mand. He  chooses  his  own  subjects.  He 
has  his  message  to  deliver.  He  desires 
to  help  do  for  the  nation  what  he  helped 
so  much  to  do  in  Wisconsin.  His  weekly 
newspaper  carries  his  message  where  his 
voice  cannot  be  heard —  a  newspaper 
which  draws  thousands  of  dollars  from 
his  lecture  receipts  every  year. 

LaFollette  the  person  and  LaFollette 
as  newspaper  readers  know  him  are  two 
distinct  individuals.  Personally  he  is 
quiet,  unassuming,  somewhat  careless  in 
dress,  soft-voiced,  kindly.  He  lacks 
humor,  it  is  true,  but  in  his  life  has  been 
little  to  encourage  that  great  quality.  In 
spite  of  his  disillusioning  experiences  with 
politicians,  he  still  believes  in  those  who 
come  bearing  gifts.  At  times  he  is  as 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

unsuspicious  as  a  child.  He  is  a  good 
listener,  breaking  into  a  conversation  with 
questions  only  when  he  feels  that  some 
one  has  some  information  useful  to  him. 
Then  he  probes,  a  long  inquisitorial  finger 
working  corkscrew-like  as  he  used  to  do 
in  his  district  attorney  days.  Fatigue  is 
something  of  which  he  knows  nothing 
when  campaigning.  He  is  made  of  piano 
wires.  He  has  delivered  forty  speeches 
in  twenty- four  hours.  In  one  forty-eight- 
day  campaign  he  averaged  eight  and  a 
half  hours  of  actual  speaking  daily.  In 
the  Senate  he  once  spoke  for  eighteen 
hours  to  head  off  vicious  legislation. 

His  wife  is,  like  the  wife  of  Bryan,  a 
true  helpmeet.  She  is  a  trained  lawyer 
and  a  writer.  They  have  two  sons  and 
two  daughters.  They  live  on  a  beautiful 
farm  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Mendota,  a 
few  miles  from  Madison,  Wisconsin. 
32 


ROBERT  M.  LAFOLLETTE 

Than  LaFollette  there  is  no  greater 
fighter  against  political  corruption  in  the 
country.  He  is  a  political  pathfinder.  At 
the  last  Republican  national  convention 
his  delegates  bent  on  supporting  him  for 
the  presidency  were  unwelcomed.  That 
is  his  fate.  Twenty  years  ago  he  was  a 
wild-eyed,  destructive,  dangerous  agita- 
tor, according  to  the  idea  of  the  crowd 
of  that  time.  Since  then  the  country  has 
come  up  to  him.  He,  however,  is  forever 
pressing  forward.  Whether  greater  vic- 
tories come  to  him  or  whether  he  goes 
down  in  defeat,  he  will  at  least  have  the 
joy  that  comes  from  having  invested  him- 
self in  that  work  which  has  made  this 
nation  a  better  home  for  the  Average 
Man. 


33 


ALBERT   BAIRD   CUMMINS 


ALBERT  BAIRD  CUMMINS 


ALBERT   BAIRD    CUMMINS 

WHILE  their  Northern  cousins  were 
screwing  up  their  courage  to  take 
the  step,  the  patriots  down  in  Mecklen- 
burg, in  the  Carolinas,  issued  the  first 
Declaration  of  Independence.  It  matters 
not  that  the  history  books  give  credit  to 
the  North.  The  facts  tell  us  that  the 
South  was  first  in  flinging  the  gauntlet  in 
the  face  of  England's  king.  And,  to 
justify  these  statements  in  this  book,  let 
us  here  say  that  among  the  signers  of 
this  Mecklenburg  declaration  appeared 
the  name  of  the  grandfather  of  the 
mother  of  Albert  Baird  Cummins,  In- 
surgent. It  is  therefore  eminently  right 
and  proper  that  his  name  should  be  close 
37 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

to  the  top  of  the  list  of  those  who  to-day 
are  fighting  for  a  government  that  will 
be  more  representative  of  the  majority  of 
the  people. 

By  right  of  training  and  business 
friendships  this  man  should  be  working 
shoulder  to  shoulder  with  those  regulars 
whose  service  to  corporations  is  greater 
than  their  service  to  their  constituents. 
For  years  he  was  a  corporation  attorney. 
His  business  associates  were,  for  the 
most  part,  corporation  men.  During  all 
his  years  he  has  been  known  as  a  good 
business  man  —  one  who  possessed  the 
ability  to  make  money  for  himself  and 
others.  While  he  once  knew  poverty, 
and  has  never  known  what  it  is  to  get 
much  without  hard  work,  he  has  not  suf- 
fered from  the  grinding  poverty  that  was 
the  lot  of  so  many  of  his  insurgent  con- 
freres. Toward  the  last  he  had  every- 
38 


'ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

thing  to  gain  by  remaining  friendly  'to 
the  corporations  and  everything  to  lose 
by  working  against  them.  That  he  chose 
the  latter  shows  what  manner  of  man 
he  is. 

Let  us,  then,  in  order  to  reach  his  in- 
surgent days,  travel  somewhat  rapidly 
the  biographical  road  from  the  time  he 
was  born  in  Carmichaels,  Pennsylvania, 
February  15,  1850,  down  to  date.  For 
mental  sustenance  he  attended  the  com- 
mon schools  of  his  native  village  until 
he  was  fourteen,  then  tried  Green  Acad- 
emy for  three  years,  and,  at  seventeen, 
entered  Waynesburg  College  for  two 
years  more.  In  September,  1869,  he 
"made  westing,"  and  we  find  him  in 
Iowa,  dividing  his  time  between  Cornell 
College,  a  recorder's  office  at  Elkader, 
carpenter  work  in  the  spring  of  1870,  an 
express  office  in  McGregor  to  the  spring 
39 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

of  1871,  jumping  eastward  to  Fort 
Wayne,  Indiana,  where  he  was  deputy 
surveyor.  Here  he  remained  two  months. 
In  those  days  he  was  gifted  with  plenty 
of  self-assurance,  the  ability  to  bluff  his 
way  through  with  little  capital  in  the  way 
of  knowledge,  and  was  not  afraid  to  dem- 
onstrate his  capacity  for  work.  So,  al- 
though he  knew  nothing  of  construction 
,  work,  he  reached  for  and  annexed  a 
position  as  division  engineer  on  the  old 
Cincinnati,  Richmond,  &  Fort  Wayne 
Railroad.  Here  he  made  good  use  of  his 
knowledge  of  surveying  and,  by  the  time- 
honored  method  of  securing  education  by 
doing,  learned  how  to  build  bridges,  lay 
tracks,  manage  wild  gangs  of  workers, 
and  perform  satisfactorily  all  other  work 
that  fell  to  his  department.  We  may  say 
he  performed  his  tasks  satisfactorily,  for, 
so  the  records  show,  he  was  promoted  to 
40 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

the  post  of  assistant  chief  engineer  before 
the  end  of  the  year.  On  January  i,  1872, 
he  became  assistant  chief  engineer  of 
the  North  Central  Michigan,  and  about 
Christmas  time  of  that  same  year  was 
called  to  Denver  to  take  a  similar  post  on 
the  Denver  &  Rio  Grande. 

During  these  engineering  years  there 
had  been  ever  present  in  him  a  desire  to 
study  law.  Although  success  was  coming 
rapidly  toward  him  in  his  engineering 
work,  and  big  money  as  a  railroad  con- 
structor was  in  plain  sight,  Cummins  held 
to  his  idea  of  becoming  a  lawyer.  We 
need  not  be  surprised,  therefore,  to  learn 
that  he,  on  reaching  Chicago  when  Den- 
ver bound,  slipped  into  an  opening  which 
he  found  in  the  great  law  offices  of 
McClellan  &  Hodges.  Of  course  the 
salary  attached  was  infinitely  lower  than 
that  of  an  engineer,  but  Cummins  was 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

more  in  love  with  the  law  than  with 
immediate  wealth.  With  McClellan  & 
Hodges  he  remained  two  years,  being 
admitted  to  the  bar  when  twenty-three 
years  old,  in  1874.  That  same  year  he 
was  married  to  Miss  Ida  L.  Gallery,  of 
Eaton  Rapids,  Michigan.  Until  1878  he 
made  his  home  in  Chicago,  practicing  as 
attorney. 

Iowa  was  then  sending  out  calls  for 
strong  men  in  all  departments  of  the 
world's  work.  Cummins  heard.  He  left 
his  Chicago  practice,  and  with  his  brother, 
J.  C.  Cummins,  opened  a  law  office  in  Des 
Moines.  This  partnership  continued  un- 
til November,  1881,  when  he  was  invited 
by  Judge  Wright  to  become  a  member  of 
the  leading  law  firm  of  the  city.  Judge 
Wright  was  one  of  the  big  men  of  his 
time.  His  law  business  was  successful. 
Its  nature  may  be  learned  from  the  fact 
42 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

that  later  his  son,  Thomas,  retired  from 
the  firm  to  become  the  representative  of 
the  Chicago,  Rock  Island,  &  Pacific  in 
Chicago.  Cummins  was,  to  use  a  street 
phrase,  "  in  right." 

For  years  the  Western  farmers  had 
been  at  the  mercy  of  the  great  barb-wire 
trust.  Independent  companies  had  tried 
to  start  up  for  the  purpose  of  relieving 
the  farmer,  but  by  lawsuits  and  other 
means  the  trust  had  killed  them  off  one 
by  one.  In  spite  of  his  affiliations  with 
the  powerful,  Cummins  undertook,  in 
1 88 1,  a  fight  that  lasted  for  five  years 
and  ended  in  the  decisive  defeat  of  the 
Washburn-Moen  Company,  the  wire  com- 
pany that  had  for  years  charged  the 
farmers  all  the  traffic  would  bear.  This 
fight  made  Cummins  a  character  with  a 
West-wide  reputation.  HE  wrm  tfofi  name 
of  a  f rieftduitjhe  people.  Not. 
"43" 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

hfefigfojLjyyjii i^KinijTQCl^ ri>  ty  but  his  abil- 
ity, as  demonstrated  in  trie  barb-wire 
fight,  won  his  firm  business  that  other- 
wise would  never  have  come  to  them.  His 
standing  among  the  members  of  his  pro- 
fession we  learn  by  discovering  that  he 
was  for  years  the  president  of  the  Polk 
County  Bar  Association. 

The  political  germ  was  in  the  air  in 
those  days  just  as  it  is  to-day.  Cummins 
naturally  interested  himself  in  political 
work.  Naturally,  as  a  leading  lawyer,  he 
was  consulted.  But  he  asked  for  noth- 
ing for  himself  until  1887,  when,  with 
many  of  his  party  leaders  against  him, 
he  was  elected  to  the  Assembly.  The 
prohibition  wave  was  then  sweeping 
across  the  Middle  West,  and  to  it  Cum- 
mins opposed  his  strength.  I»steaiLo£ 
prohibition  he  demanded  local  optiori^and 
higher  licenses.  To  take  this  stand  in 
44 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

those   days   called   for  backbone   of  the 
unbending  kind. 

In  the  Legislature  Cummins  climbed 
forward  because  of  his  work  in  revising 
the_laws  governing  railroads .  His  Work 
was  so  fair  to  both  railroads  and  state 
that  people  wondered  how  it  was  possible 
for  a  railroad  attorney  to  do  as  he  did. 
An  Iowa  newspaper  editor,  in  showing 
how  suspicious  many  were  of  the  Cum- 
mins honesty,  tells  how  a  party  of  manu- 
facturers and  merchants  called  upon  him 
to  support  a  bill  providing  for  more  equi- 
table charges  on  short  hauls.  He  promised 
to  support  it.  A  few  days  later  the  same 
committee  called  and  asked  him  to  with- 
draw his  support.  "  Why  have  you 
changed  ?  "  he  asked.  "  That  man,  Cum- 
mins/' they  answered,  "  a  railroad  attor- 
ney, is  the  bill's  father,  and  there  must  be 
something  hidden  in  it  that  is  bad  for 
45 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

us."  But  the  bill  was  passed,  and  those 
people  learned  that  the  bill  was  square 
and  aboveboard  and  for  the  best  interests 
of  all  concerned. 

With  the  Democrats  in  power  in  1892, 
the  Republican  State  Committee  called 
Cummins  to  preside  at  the  state  conven- 
tion. The  speech  he  made  at  the  opening 
of  the  convention  swept  the  delegates  off 
their  feet  and  later  proved  one  of  the 
most  powerful  pieces  of  campaign  liter- 
ature. Following  that,  he  was  alternate- 
at-large  to  the  national  convention  at 
Minneapolis,  and,  later  that  same  year, 
another  convention  chose  him  elector-at- 
large.  In  1896  he  was  sent  to'  St.  Louis 
as  a  delegate,  and  was  there  chosen  a 
member  of  the  national  committee  and 
held  that  post  for  four  years.  Previous 
to  this,  in  1894,  he  had  been  a  candidate 
for  United  States  Senator  but  was  de- 
46 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

feated.  Later,  when  Senator  Gear  died 
and  a  successor  had  to  be  appointed, 
Cummins  thought  that  the  appointment 
would  come  to  him,  but  Jonathan  Pren- 
tiss  Dolliver  was  chosen  instead.  Then, 
to  make  up  for  slights  given  him  by  the 
political  ring,  he  went  direct  to  the  people 
and  became  Governor  in  1902;  and  so 
well  did  he  serve  them,  he  was  sent  back 
three  times  by  an  overwhelming  vofce  of 
the  people  of  his  state.  In  November, 
1908,  he  was  elected  to  the  United  States 
Senate  to  fill  a  vacancy  caused  by  the 
death  of  Senator  W.  B.  Allison.  In  Jan- 
uary, 1909,  he  was  re-elected  for  the  term 
beginning  March  4.  His  Senate  term 
will  end  in  1915. 

We  have  now  cleared  away  all  the  bio-  ] 

graphical  underbrush  and  may  look  at  the 

man  himself  for  a  moment.     He  is  one 

inch  under  six  feet  in  height,  has  broad 

47 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

shoulders,  a  deep  chest,  stands  erect,  is 
crowned  with  iron-gray  hair,  has  eyes 
that  look  out  humorously  and  kindly, 
dresses  as  a  successful  man  should  dress, 
and  cannot  escape  the  charge  of  being 
handsome.  Like  Ben  Adhem,  it  may  be 
written  of  him  that  he  loves  his  fellow- 
men.  He  and  Mrs.  Cummins  are  great 
entertainers  and  enjoy  mixing  with  other 
social  beings.  Socially,  as  well  as  for  the 
good  of  the  entire  state,  he  made  an  ideal 
governor. 

Lest  what  has  been  written  thus  far 
may  lead  the  casual  reader  to  believe 
Senator  Cummins  a  corporation  attorney 
first,  last,  and  all  the  time,  let  it  be  here 
stated  that  than  the  railroads  Senator 
Cummins  enjoys  no  bitterer  enemies. 
And  here  is  the  initial  reason.  In  his 
Assembly  days  he  proved  himself  no  easy 
man  to  handle  for  tooling  purposes.  In 
48 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

his  political  work  after  his  Assembly  days 
he  failed  to  become  more  tractable.  When 
he  aspired  to  the  Senate,  railroad  influ- 
ences defeated  him.  When  he  sought  the 
governorship,  railroad  money  again  op- 
posed him.  But  all  this  time  the  opposi- 
tion was  the  opposition  of  influences  that 
did  not  come  out  strongly  in  the  open 
against  him. 

The  fire  was  kindled  during  guberna- 
torial days  that  smoked  out  the  animals 
that  in  the  past  had  chosen  to  hide  in  the 
hole  under  the  political  machine.  With 
the  kindly  assistance  of  J.  W.  Blythe,  at- 
torney and  representative  of  the  Great 
.'Northern  and  The  Chicago,  Burlington, 
&  Quincy  railroads,  what  is  known  as 
"  The  Molsberry  Bill "  had  been  nursed 
through  the  Assembly  and  Senate.  On 
the  Governor's  table  it  lay  for  signature. 
To  the  Governor  came  politicians,  busi- 
49 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

ness  men,  manufacturers,  railroad  repre- 
sentatives. They  called  for  the  signature. 
The  Governor  refused.  The  bill  was  in- 
tended to  "  New  Jerseyize  "  the  state.  It 
placed  no  limit  on  the  debts  a  railroad 
might  contract.  Cummins,  seeing  the  bill 
through  eyes  made  keen  by  years  of  legal 
prying,  met  the  railroad  men  on  their  own 
ground  and  answered  argument  for  argu- 
ment. It  was  bad  for  the  state,  therefore 
it  must  be  vetoed.  And  it  was  vetoed. 

Had  he  signed  that  bill  the  state  would 
not  have  blamed  him  much.  It  had  been 
passed  by  the  legislative  representatives 
of  the  people.  It  had  the  support  of  the 
biggest  business  men  and  manufacturers. 
The  bosom  friends  of  the  Governor,  his 
political  helpers,  the  men  upon  whom  he 
had  depended  for  his  legal  business  —  all 
these  demanded  that  he  sign  it.  Yet  this 
man,  knowing  the  bill  to  be  bad  for  the 


ALBERT    BAIRD    CUMMINS 

state  and  the  country,  dared  to  stand  out 
against  all  this  pressure.  That  act,  per- 
haps more  than  any  other  act  in  his  life, 
showed  him  in  his  true  colors  and  did 
more  than  all  his  talking  to  send  him  back 
to  the  Governor's  chair  for  three  terms. 

As  a  governor  Cummins  proved  himself 
a  master.  During  his  formative  years  he 
had  been  carpenter,  school-teacher,  clerk, 
express  messenger,  surveyor,  railroad 
builder.  He  therefore  had  been  in  touch 
with  men  in  all  departments  of  work.  He 
knew  the  point  of  view  of  the  common 
folks.  On  top  of  this  he  had  the  training 
that  comes  to  the  successful  attorney.  He 
had  met  and  talked  with  and  studied  big 
men.  He  knew  their  point  of  view.  With 
this  knowledge  stored  away  in  his  mind 
he  was  fit  to  render  just  judgments.  That 
he  did  render  just  judgments  is  shown  by; 
his  entire  public  career. 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

As  a  Republican  he  is  not  for  free  trade, 
but  he  is  not  in  favor  of  the  tariff  that 
has  been  manufactured  for  the  benefit  of 
special  interests.  He  believes  in  the  elec- 
tion of  United  States  Senators  by  direct 
primary.  He  believes  in  the  federal  con- 
trol of  corporations.  And,  what  is  of 
greatest  interest  in  these  times,  he  is 
against  the  Aldrich- Cannon  rule  of  the 
national  government.  The  record  shows 
him  to  be  among  the  most  pronounced 
insurgent  leaders  in  the  Senate. 

Personally  Senator  Cummins  is  a  lik- 
able, friend-making,  friend-holding  indi- 
vidual. In  the  face  of  his  record  no 
words  will  add  to  his  praise  as  a  friend 
of  popular  government.  He  has  suc- 
ceeded in  business  and  has  succeeded  in 
life  because  he  has,  as  Lincoln  advised, 
done  right  as  he  understood  it. 


GEORGE   WILLIAM   NORRIS 


GEORGE  WILLIAM  NORRIS 


GEORGE   WILLIAM    NORRIS 

RIGHT  at  the  start  of  any  biographical 
sketch  of  George  William  Norris  it 
is  well  to  say  that  he  is,  above  all  other 
things,  a  normal  man.  Neither  in  his  life 
nor  in  himself  is  there  anything  that  wor- 
shipers of  the  Napoleonic  would  dub  dra- 
matic. His  style  of  skittering  through  the 
political  sky  is  not  meteoric.  There  are  in 
him  the  calmness,  the  regularity,  the  abso- 
lute certainty  of  the  moon.  Unlike  La- 
Follette,  he  cannot  point  to  heart-breaking 
poverty  in  youth  nor  to  the  bitter  opposi- 
tion of  machine  politicians  of  the  vulture 
breed.  From  the  time  he  was  a  farm  lad  in 
Sandusky  County,  Ohio,  up  to  and  includ- 
ing the  time  he  was  elected  to  Congress 
from  the  Fifth  Nebraska  District  in  1903, 
55 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

he  has  been  as  regular  in  his  political  be- 
liefs as  regularity  itself.  He  has  not  been 
a  voice  in  the  political  wilderness  proclaim- 
ing a  new  era. 

However,  in  order  that  we  may  not  sus- 
pect this  man  of  being  without  an  individ- 
uality of  his  own,  let  us  here  condense  his 
biographical  data  into  a  paragraph  and 
then  take  up  those  facts  with  which  we  are 
concerned  and  discover  for  ourselves  what 
manner  of  man  he  really  is.  We  find,  if 
we  care  to  go  back,  that  he  was  born  on  a 
farm  in  Sandusky  County,  Ohio,  July  n, 
1 86 1,  thus  managing  to  evade  any  tempta- 
tion to  enlist  in  that  great  unpleasantness 
known  as  the  Civil  War.  His  father,  like 
most  farmers,  was  not  Unduly  burdened 
with  wealth,  and  George  worked  out  for 
farmers  during  the  farm-working  season, 
attending  school  for  but  a  few  months 
each  winter. 

56 


GEORGE    WILLIAM    NORRIS 

The  short  winter  schooling,  however, 
awakened  his  desire  for  some  other  career 
than  that  offered  by  the  farm.  He  deter- 
mined to  move  forward.  Upon  finishing 
the  country  school .  and  his  self-selected 
studies  at  home,  he  became  a  country 
school-teacher  in  order  to  earn  money  for 
a  higher  education.  Within  a  couple  of 
years  he  had  saved  enough  out  of  his 
scanty  earnings  to  enter  Baldwin  Univer- 
sity at  Berea,  Ohio.  Later  he  shifted  to 
the  Northern  Indiana  Normal  School  be- 
cause of  the  opportunities  that  institution 
offered  young  men  without  golden  spoons 
which  might  be  pawned.  By  scrimping, 
saving,  and  pinching  he  managed  to  work 
his  way  through  the  ordinary  academic 
course,  and  followed  that  by  borrowing 
enough  money  to  carry  him  through  the 
law  school.  He  was  admitted  to  the  bar 
in  1883.  With  characteristic  carefulness 
57 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

he  did  not  plunge  directly  into  the  uncer- 
tainties of  the  legal  profession.  He  taught 
school  for  another  year  in  order  to  earn 
money  for  a  law  library  and  a  few  dollars 
extra  to  tide  him  over  the  waiting  period 
which  was  to  be  expected  at  the  beginning 
of  his  law  work. 

The  call  of  the  West  came  to  him  about 
this  time,  and  we  find  him,  in  1885,  trek- 
king across  the  country  to  Nebraska.  His 
original  intention  was  to  settle  down  to  the 
slow  and  steady  practice  of  law.  But  in 
the  Nebraska  of  those  days  there  was  little 
opportunity  for  lawyers  who  failed  to  woo 
the  goddess  of  politics.  Norris,  in  his 
office  at  Beaver  City,  saw  the  light,  and, 
almost  before  the  paint  on  his  shingle  was 
dry,  became  prosecuting  attorney  for  Fur- 
nas  County.  This  position,  coupled  with 
other  business  that  came  in  its  trail,  en- 
abled him  to  marry  Miss  Pluma  Lashley 
58 


GEORGE    WILLIAM    NORRIS 

in  1890,  and,  with  a  home  as  an  anchor- 
age, he  settled  down  with  the  air  of  one 
whose  moving  days  were  over. 

Ten  years  after  leaving  Ohio  —  in  1895, 
to  be  exact  —  we  find  him,  during  the  Pop- 
ulist turmoil,  taking  his  place  as  district 
judge  after  beating  his  opponent  by  a  bare 
majority  of  six  votes  in  a  district  made  up 
of  seven  counties.  He  was  re-elected  dis- 
trict judge  in  1-901,  and  resigned  in  1904 
to  make  the  race  for  Congress. 

Norris  has  always  been  a  regular  Re- 
publican. When  he  first  went  to  Congress, 
he  held  the  ordinary  provincial  idea  of  the 
importance  of  his  position.  But  it  did  not 
take  him  more  than  one  term  to  discover 
that  there  was  something  not  so  square  in 
Washington  as  it  should  be  according  to 
Nebraska  ideals.  That  a  Congressman, 
especially  a  new  one,  is  of  but  little  more 
value  than  a  figure  on  a  chessboard,  when 
59 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

viewed  through  Washington  glasses,  was 
something  of  a  disillusioning  surprise  to 
Norris.  When  he  returned  home,  he  said 
to  Lon  Cone,  his  political  helper,  "  There 
is  something  wrong  with  the  system.  I 
don't  know  what  it  is,  and  I  don't  know 
that  I  can  do  anything  to  correct  it,  but 
some  sort  of  house-cleaning  is  needed 
down  there."  That  was  the  first  sign  he 
had  shown  of  irregularity. 

During  the  campaign  of  1908  the  reg- 
ulars and  the  insurgents  were  beginning 
to  bestir  themselves  over  the  matter  of 
Cannonism.  Norris  stated  very  definitely 
where  he  stood.  "  I  am  against  Cannon," 
he  announced  in  his  speeches,  "  but  I 
should  vote  for  him  for  Speaker  in  pref- 
erence to  any  Democrat.  To  elect  a  Dem- 
ocrat for  the  place  would  tie  up  all  legis- 
lation and  render  the  work  of  Congress 
futile  and  ineffective.  I  am  a  Republican. 
60 


GEORGE    WILLIAM    NORRIS 

My  quarrel  is  not  with  the  party,  but  with 
the  men  who  are  using  it  to  advance  their 
own  selfish  ends." 

That  speech  showed  him  to  be  a  Repub- 
lican with  backbone  enough  to  stand  up 
and  announce  that  there  were  men  within 
the  party  —  men  in  responsible  positions 
—  who  were  unworthy  of  trust.  He 
showed  that  he  realized  that  changes 
would  have  to  be  made,  but  he  believed 
that  the  changes  could  be  made  by  the 
party  members  themselves.  The  Demo- 
crats, of  course,  scattered  a  tremendous 
slush  fund  over  the  district  in  an  effort  to 
defeat  him.  Even  Mr.  Bryan  thought  him 
of  enough  importance  to  come  in  and  per- 
sonally assist  in  the  attempt  to  end  his 
congressional  career.  In  spite  of  all  this 
opposition,  Norris  ran  seven  hundred 
and  sixty-nine  votes  ahead  of  Mr.  Taft 
and  emerged  with  a  small  but  safe  ma- 
61 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

jority.     Mr.   Bryan  carried  the   district 
for  himself. 

Thus  it  was  that  George  W.  Norris  was 
on  hand  to  lead  the  onslaught  upon  the 
House  of  Cannon  last  March.  In  the  news 
dispatches  of  those  strenuous  fighting 
days  Norris  found  his  name  heralded  as 
leader.  All  this  came  as  a  surprise,  just 
as  it  surprised  those  folks  who  had  always 
known  him  as  a  quiet,  friendly,  peaceful 
sort  of  person.  He  had  only  done  what 
he  thought  was  the  right  thing  to  do.  He 
felt  that  Cannon  should  be  opposed,  there- 
fore he  went  in  and  opposed  him.  He  was 
not  looking  for  personal  glory.  As  a  reg- 
ular sort  of  man,  he  wanted  to  do  that 
which  would  insure  the  success  of  his 
party.  If  to  clean  the  party  it  was 
necessary  to  administer  chastisement  to 
folks  of  the  Cannon  school,  well,  much 
as  he  hated  the  turmoil,  Norris  was 
62 


GEORGE    WILLIAM    NORRIS 

ready  to  do  his  part  in  the  administer- 
ing business. 

Financially  Norris  is  also  fit  to  take  his 
place  as  an  average  man.  In  his  early 
Nebraska  days  he  had  settled  at  Beaver 
City  because  that  place  promised  to  make 
good  the  promises  of  his  boomers.  The 
promise  was  not  kept,  and  Norris  moved 
to  McCook,  which  is  in  Redwillow  County. 
There  he  lives  in  a  small,  unpretentious 
home,  with  a  green  lawn  about  it  and  pro- 
tected from  the  sun  by  shade  trees  of  early 
inhabitant  age.  He  owns  this  home,  a 
couple  of  vacant  lots,  three  thousand  dol- 
lars' worth  of  stock  in  a  Masonic  Temple 
that  has  never  paid  any  dividends  and 
which  will  never  pay  more  than  five  per 
cent,  a  hotel  at  Beaver  City  that  earns 
enough  to  pay  the  taxes,  and  that  ends  it. 

McCook  is  rather  proud  of  the  family 
of  Congressman  Norris.  The  present 

63 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

Mrs.  Norris  was  the  chum  of  the  first 
Mrs.  Norris,  who  died  in  1901,  leaving 
three  daughters,  Hazel,  aged  16,  Marion, 
aged  13,  and  Gertrude,  aged  9.  The 
Norrises  are  typical  small  townfolks. 
Like  a  country  bank  cashier,  Congress- 
man Norris  spends  his  loafing  hours  at 
home,  taking  his  mental  exercise  while 
mowing  the  lawn  and  relieving  himself 
mentally  by  resting  with  the  characters 
Dickens  touched  into  life.  Political  op- 
ponents have  never  been  able  to  discover 
any  taints  in  the  Norris  career.  Morally 
and  financially  he  has  been  regular.  He 
has  always  been  a  sort  of  square  deal 
person.  He  has  no  hesitancy  about  tell- 
ing the  truth. 

During  the  hard  times  of  the  early  nine- 
ties, when  Eastern  loan  companies,  unable 
to  realize  on  investments,  were  foreclos- 
ing mortgages  on  Nebraska  homesteads, 


GEORGE    WILLIAM    NORRIS 

it  was  Norris  who  helped  many  a  man 
save  his  home.  At  that  time  he  was  dis- 
trict judge.  A  degree  of  confirmation  by 
the  court  was  a  necessary  formality  in 
obtaining  possession  of  the  land.  Before 
granting  any  decrees,  Norris  always  per- 
sonally investigated.  If  the  man  was 
honestly  trying  to  pay  but  was  unable  to 
do  so  on  account  of  the  times,  Norris  re- 
fused to  help  the  companies  dispossess 
him.  This  action  of  his,  done  at  a  time 
when  it  was  not  even  prospective  political 
capital,  helped  hold  many  a  vote  at  a  later 
day. 

In  this  story  is  nothing  dramatic,  noth- 
ing unusual,  nothing  exceptional.  The 
Norris  life  has  flowed  along  in  a  smooth 
current.  His  trials  have  been  no  greater 
than  those  that  come  to  thousands  of 
average  men.  His  life  has  been  that  of 
the  average  man.  For  that  reason  he  is 
65 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

fit  for  the  work  he  is  doing  —  he  is  a  fit 
representative  of  average  men.  He  pos- 
sesses great  ability  of  the  steady,  plod- 
ding, persistent  sort.  He  is  not  spectacu- 
lar, but  he  is  sure.  He  is  dependable, 
reliable.  And,  as  his  constituents  have 
discovered,  the  best  ability  is  reliability. 


66 


JOSEPH   LITTLE   BRISTOW 


JOSEPH  LITTLE  BRISTOW 


JOSEPH   LITTLE  BRISTOW 

BORN  in  a  log  cabin  in  Wolfe  County, 
Kentucky,  during  one  of  those  times 
that  tried  men's  souls,  Joseph  Little  Bris^- 
tow  stands  before  the  public  stamped  with 
the  influences  of  heredity.  His  father, 
the  son  of  a  Methodist  minister,  was  a 
school-teacher  until  the  Union  called  to 
him  to  substitute  the  musket  for  the  birch. 
It  was  on  July  22,  1861,  that  Joseph  was 
given  to  the  world.  The  influences  of  the 
ante-bellum  period  played  upon  the  mother 
and  materialized  in  the  son.  Both  parents 
being  rigid  religionists,  holding  to  justice 
as  they  did  to  life,  their  training  of  their 
child  made  for  righteousness  as  they  un- 
derstood it.  They  never  learned  to  com- 
promise with  injustice  and  wrongdoing. 
69 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

Raised  in  poverty  during  those  painful 
formative  years  of  the  new  country's 
growth,  young  Bristow  became  inoculated 
with  the  fighting  germs  that  have  so  often 
stirred  him  into  that  activity  so  detrimen- 
tal to  the  peace  and  happiness  of  public 
evilists. 

After  the  war,  the  work  of  the  school- 
master substituted  for  the  service  of  a 
Methodist  minister,  Bristow's  father 
earned  the  meager  income  necessary  to 
meet  the  almost  insignificant  living  ex- 
penses of  their  simple  family  life.  Pov- 
erty was  an  ever-present  visitor  in  the 
Bristow  home,  ease  was  a  thing  unknown. 
Yet  to  these  people,  sustained  as  they  were 
by  an  ever-burning  religious  faith,  pov- 
erty was  not  looked  upon  as  a  galling  bur- 
den. They  worked  as  well  as  they  knew 
how  with  the  materials  at  hand,  develop- 
ing strength  of  character  with  endurance 
70 


JOSEPH    LITTLE   BRISTOW 

of  body  each  day  as  they  went  along. 
Knowing  something  of  the  parents,  it  is 
easy  for  one  to  understand  the  early  train- 
ing Joseph  Bristow  received. 

Pioneer  folks  find  the  way  to  marriage 
an  easy  one,  so  we  need  not  be  surprised 
to  find  young  Joseph,  the  down  just  dark- 
ening his  cheeks,  plunging  into  matrimony 
on  November  n,  1879,  his  trip  being 
shared  by  Margaret  A.  Hendrix,  of  Flem- 
ing County,  Kentucky.  Like  so  many 
others  whose  names  later  became  stars  in 
the  firmament  of  insurgency,  Bristow 
heard  the  call  of  the  West  and  found  his 
way  to  Elk  County,  Kansas,  that  same 
marriage  year.  A  farm  furnished  a  pre- 
carious living  for  a  space,  but  the  life  of 
the  farmer  was  not  to  the  liking  of  one 
whose  forebears  found  delight  in  educat- 
ing men. 

At  twenty-one,  then,  Bristow  moved  to 

n 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

Baldwin,  Kansas,  for  the  reason  that 
Baker  University  honored  that  village 
with  its  presence.  Expenses  were  met  by 
the  time-honored  expedient  of  taking  stu- 
dent boarders.  Mrs.  Bristow  shared  her 
husband's  ambition  to  one  day  become,  like 
his  father  and  grandfather,  a  Methodist 
minister.  She  was  willing  to  undertake 
the  work  of  helping  her  husband  secure 
his  education,  even  though  she  must  have 
known  that  the  minister's  life,  as  well  as 
the  life  of  the  minister's  wife,  is  ever  one 
of  sacrifice  and  self-abnegation.  The 
country  owes  much  to  the  brave  little 
woman  who  shared  the  educational  pio- 
neer days  of  the  future  public  servant. 

At  college  it  is  not  always  what  the  cur- 
riculum offers  that  proves  of  greatest 
value.  Education  is  best  secured  by  doing 
things.  In  college  Bristow  was  a  doer. 
Fraternities  and  athletics  were  of  less  im- 
72 


JOSEPH   LITTLE   BRISTOW 

portance  in  those  heathenish  days  than 
they  have  become  in  our  more  enlightened 
times.  Instead  of  the  social  joys  of  fra- 
ternities which  are  organized  to  exclude, 
and  of  college  athletics  so  much  magnified 
by  the  modern  student,  Bristow  and  his 
fellows  found  their  surplus  energy  outlet 
in  engineering  the  destinies  of  two  literary 
societies.  One  was  called  the  Athenian, 
and  its  hated  rival  was  the  Biblical.  No 
prize  will  be  given  those  who  guess  that 
Bristow  belonged  to  the  latter. 

One  needs  to  know  but  little  about  col- 
leges to  understand  that  the  successful  col- 
lege politician  is  about  as  wily  a  person  as 
the  gentlemen  who  dominate  the  govern- 
ing business  in  our  big  cities.  In  those 
college  days  Bristow  was  the  leader  in 
political  affairs.  More  than  once  did  the 
noble  Athenians  bite  the  political  dust  at 
the  Bristow  command.  He  speedily  be- 
73 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

came  an  organizer  of  men.  His  grasp  of 
detail  and  his  power  of  welding  this  detail 
into  an  harmonious  whole  placed  him  at 
the  top.  In  the  mimic  school  world  Bris- 
tow  fought  battles  that  taught  him  lessons 
that  have  since  stood  him  and  his  country 
in  good  stead. 

In  1884  he  organized  a  Elaine  and  Lo- 
gan club,  and  rounded  up  under  his  ban- 
ner fifty-one  of  the  fifty-two  voters  in  the 
school.  To  accomplish  this,  after  all  the 
school  fights  he  had  engineered,  was  no 
slight  task.  To  his  teachers  Bristow  was 
known  as  a  student  who  dug  the  heart  out 
of  every  subject  he  studied,  yet  they  also 
were  forced  to  shake  their  heads  sadly  on 
all  election  days  over  the  absence  of  their 
strenuous  pupil.  To  keep  Bristow  in 
school  on  election  day  called  for  teachers 
capable  of  performing  one  of  the  labors  of 
Hercules. 

74 


JOSEPH    LITTLE   BRISTOW 

In  addition  to  boarding  fellow  students, 
Bristow  earned  money  by  serving  as  a 
persuasive  book  agent,  farm  helper,  man- 
of-all-work,  and  editor  of  the  local  news- 
paper. Upon  his  graduation  in  1886,  his 
dream  of  serving  in  the  ministry  having 
been  changed  for  the  desire  to  serve  in 
politics,  he  was  elected  clerk  of  the  Dis- 
trict Court  of  Douglas  County.  To  se- 
cure votes  he  borrowed  money  and  hired 
a  horse  to  carry  him  to  every  voter  in  the 
district.  So  little  money  did  he  have  that 
it  is  said  he  was  forced  to  take  his  choice 
between  buying  an  overcoat  or  a  diction- 
ary. If  he  had  not  chosen  the  latter  — 
But  why  speculate  ? 

During  his  clerkship  days  he  was  chosen 
president  of  the  Young  Men's  Republican 
Club  of  Lawrence.  In  1888  he  was  re- 
elected  to  his  court  office.  All  the  time  his 
eyes  had  been  open  to  things  political.  He 
75 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

stumped  the  state  for  Harrison  during 
the  presidential  campaign,  and  annexed 
the  reputation  necessary  to  secure  him  a 
position  as  secretary  of  the  Republican 
State  Committee.  He  next  became  pri- 
vate secretary  to  Governor  Morrill,  follow- 
ing that  with  an  attempt  to  connect  with 
election  to  Congress.  After  a  strenuous 
campaign  he  was  defeated  by  a  small  ma- 
jority. During  the  days  that  the  political 
sun  failed  to  shine  upon  him  he  became 
a  newspaper  man.  For  instance,  from 
1890  to  1895,  he  owned  and  edited  "  The 
Salina  Daily  Republican,"  left  that  for 
"The  Ottawa  Herald/'  dropped  the  pen 
for  politics,  and  did  not  again  take  it  up 
until  February  I,  1903,  when  he  bought 
"The  Salina  Republican- Journal." 

The  energy  and  skill  of  the  man  won 
the  attention  of  President  McKinley  dur- 
ing the  great  campaign  of  1896,  and,  in 
76 


JOSEPH    LITTLE   BRISTOW 

spite  of  the  strong  protests  of  the  machine 
politicians  in  Kansas  and  Washington, 
Bristow  was  offered  and  accepted  the 
position  of  Fourth  Assistant  Postmaster- 
General.  Bristow  knew  then  that  this 
office  promised  him  little  honor,  small  pay, 
and  much  hard  work.  But  he  also  knew 
that  it  would  teach  him,  as  few  other  posi- 
tions would,  the  political  condition  of  the 
country  in  general  and  of  the  workings 
of  the  government  at  Washington  in 
particular. 

As  assistant  to  the  Postmaster-General 
he  dealt  with  the  removal  and  appointment 
of  thousands  of  little  postmasters  through- 
out the  country,  the  postal  secret  service, 
and  thousands  of  little  jobs  that  would 
kill  any  man  not  in  love  with  the  work  of 
mastering  details.  It  was  while  doing  his 
daily  detail  work  that  he  discovered  the 
irregularities  in  the  management  of  the 
77 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

postal  service,  particularly  in  Cuba.  For 
a  decade  a  systematic  robbery  of  the  gov- 
ernment had  been  carried  on  by  postal 
employees  and  officials.  The  loot  had  been 
shared  with  men  high  up  in  the  ranks  of 
the  Republican  party.  To  attempt  to  pun- 
ish these  men  was  to  invite  political  sui- 
cide. They  were  entrenched  behind  polit- 
ical power  and  unlimited  wealth.  The 
great  newspapers  were  at  their  command. 
Bristow  knew  this.  But  never  yet  had  a 
Bristow  compromised  with  corruption. 
He  was  not  in  love  with  the  work  of  fer- 
reting out  criminals,  but  if  duty  sent  him 
to  that  task  he  was  determined  to  do  what 
justice  to  the  service  demanded  done. 

The  country  knows  what  he  did  witK 
the  backing  of  President  McKinley  in  the 
matter  of  the  Cuban  postal  frauds.  He 
worked  with  fifty  trained  investigators 
for  nearly  a  year  during  the  Roosevelt 

78 


JOSEPH    LITTLE   BRISTOW 

regime  investigating  the  post-offices  in  the 
United  States.  One  thousand  offices  were 
investigated,  some  of  the  records  being 
studied  for  ten  years  rearward.  Bristow 
read  two  hundred  thousand  typewritten 
pages  of  reports,  analyzed  them,  collated 
the  facts,  and  then  edited  the  result  into  a 
report  of  only  ten  thousand  words.  Of 
this  report  President  Roosevelt  said,  "  Mr. 
Bristow' s  report  is  a  record  of  as  impor- 
tant bit  of  investigating  work  as  has  been 
done  under  the  government." 

It  would  have  been  a  great  work  had 
Bristow  done  it  with  the  assistance  of  all 
the  government  employees.  But  when  it 
is  known  that  the  report  was  made  with 
the  corruptionists  of  great  wealth  and 
great  power  arrayed  against  him,  this 
work  becomes  monumental.  Every  effort 
was  made  to  call  Bristow  from  his  task. 
Frantic  officials,  rotten  with  corruption, 
79 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

fled  to  their  protectors  higher  up  for  help. 
Political  machinery,  newspapers,  detec- 
tives —  all  forces  were  used.  But  Bris- 
tow  held  firm.  He  went  forward  with  the 
precision  and  force  of  a  hydraulic  drill. 
He  was  backed  by  a  President  who  loved 
a  fight  for  the  square  deal.  He  made  his 
report  in  the  face  of  the  objections  of 
leaders  of  the  party  he  had  served  all  his 
life.  Promises  of  rich  political  gifts  failed 
to  swerve  him  from  the  truth. 

Because  President  Roosevelt  needed  a 
special  commissioner  to  investigate  the 
problems  connected  with  the  Panama 
Railroad,  Bristow  resigned  in  January, 
1905.  His  report  was  made  in  August  of 
the  same  year,  and  practically  all  his 
recommendations  were  accepted  by  Con- 
gress. He  again  visited  Panama  to  per- 
form duties  under  Secretary  of  War  Taft 
and  was  praised  for  his  accuracy  and  in- 
80 


JOSEPH    LITTLE    BRISTOW 

telligence.  In  1908  he  made  another  re- 
port for  Secretary  Taft,  leaving  his  news- 
paper in  other  hands  in  order  to  render  the 
government  this  special  service. 

With  the  machine  against  him,  and  all 
the  Republican  corruptionists  all  over  the 
country  doing  what  they  could  to  defeat 
him,  Bristow  climbed  into  the  Senate  by 
defeating  Senator  Long.  Only  the  direct 
primaries  saved  him.  Had  the  old  conven- 
tion system  obtained,  he  would  have  been 
snowed  under  by  the  freezing  wealth  of 
the  corporations.  By  going  direct  to  the 
people  —  who  remembered  his  work  in  the 
postal  scandals  —  he  won  the  votes  needed 
to  destroy  many  an  important  cog  in  the 
machine  of  his  state.  He  told  his  fellow 
citizens  that  railway  rates  should  be  based 
on  the  cost  of  service  to  the  railroads  and 
not  upon  the  value  of  the  service  to  the 
public,  and  that  all  the  railroads  of  the 
81 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

nation  should  be  under  the  control  of  a 
national  bureau  with  power  to  make  thor- 
ough investigations  of  the  physical  value 
of  the  railroad  property,  the  cost  of  opera- 
tion, etc.,  and  upon  its  findings  base  just 
rates. 

Bristow  is  personally  fearless.  It  is  re- 
lated that,  with  a  handful  of  companions, 
he  rushed  into  a  mob,  rescued  a  negro, 
swung  him  into  a  doorway,  took  the  noose 
from  his  neck,  and  then  caused  the  mob  to 
disperse.  To  the  evilists  he  is  cold,  piti- 
less, and  insatiable.  He  seems  to  be  jus- 
tice incarnate.  In  performance  of  his 
duty  he  recognizes  neither  friend  nor  foe. 
He  possesses  no  genius  for  friendship, 
yet  those  friends  he  has  are  grappled  to 
him  by  hoops  of  steel.  He  does  not  win 
a  sunshiny  personal  popularity,  but  he 
does  win  votes  because  the  people  know  he 
is  honest  and  absolutely  sincere.  Children 
82 


JOSEPH   LITTLE  BRISTOW 

like  him.  Than  that  there  is  no  greater 
compliment.  His  personal  life  is  open  to 
the  closest  investigation.  Had  he  pos- 
sessed a  closet  skeleton,  the  sleuths  of  the 
enemies  stirred  up  in  postal  scandal  days 
.would  have  discovered  and  uncovered  it. 

Working  almost  alone,  he  has  won  and 
held  the  friendship  of  McKinley,  Roose- 
velt, and  Taft.  A  man  who  can  do  this 
must  be  something  of  a  man.  He  suc- 
ceeds because  of  his  genius  for  work.  In 
his  newspaper  days  he  was  at  his  office  at 
four  o'clock  in  the  morning  and  stayed 
there  all  day.  For  recreation  he  calls  for 
more  work. 

In  personal  appearance  he  is  tall,  un- 
gainly, gaunt,  has  a  stoop  in  the  shoulders 
from  much  work  at  the  desk,  swings  along 
with  an  awkward  stride,  never  appears 
without  a  frock  coat,  —  a  liking  probably 
inherited  from  ministerial  ancestors,  — 

83 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

has  hazel  eyes,  a  large  mouth,  and  a  tu- 
multuous sort  of  voice.  He  is  in  no  sense 
an  orator.  The  polish  of  the  platform 
star  is  not  his.  Yet  he  holds  his  hearers 
because  of  his  deep  sincerity,  his  imposing 
array  of  facts  so  carefully  marshaled  and 
so  cleverly  handled,  his  knowledge  of  gov- 
ernment manifested  in  his  editorials  and 
his  speeches  and  gleaned  from  reading 
heavy  books  far  into  the  night,  and  a  per- 
sonality that  can  be  the  possession  of  no 
man  who  is  not  living  a  life  that  is  and 
ever  has  been  "  on  the  square." 


84 


JONATHAN  PRENTISS  DOLLIVER 


JONATHAN  PRENTISS  DOLLIVER 


JONATHAN   PRENTISS 
DOLLIVER 

ONLY  by  adoption  is  Senator  Dolliver 
a  Westerner.  And  yet  there  be  wise 
'folks  who  will  say  that  Iowa  is  this  big 
man's  home  because  the  spirit  of  the  man 
is  lowan  and  would  fit  nowhere  else. 
That  he  was  born  in  West  Virginia  is 
most  true.  To  be  more  exact  we  may  say 
that  he  was  born  near  Ringwood  in  Pres- 
ton County  on  February  6,  1858,  and,  if 
the  bread-winning  occupation  of  the  father 
be  of  interest,  we  may  say  that  he  was  a 
minister  who,  while  without  wealth,  was 
able  to  send  his  sturdy  son  to  the  village 
schools  and  provide  him  with  that  food 
which  is  essential  to  a  youngster  bent  on 
87 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

becoming  a  man  with  a  sound  body,  fit 
to  house  a  mind  of  more  than  average 
worth. 

It  may  have  been  in  response  to  that 
law  which  compels  cream  to  find  its  way 
to  the  top  of  the  milk  that  the  Dolliver 
youth  left  what  was  then  the  somewhat 
indolent  and  sleepy  South  and  penetrated 
into  what  seemed  the  distant  West.  True 
it  is  that  this  West  was  east  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi River,  but  that  the  journey  was 
somewhat  of  the  nature  of  an  adventure 
to  the  eager-eyed  Southerner  is  something 
we  may  well  believe.  However,  before 
we  do  more  than  make  this  mention  of 
the  migratory  tendency  of  the  youth,  let 
us  hark  back  to  the  boyhood  days  and  in 
a  somewhat  more  leisurely  manner  jour- 
ney upward  to  these  more  strenuous  in- 
surgent days. 

Like  many  another  man  who  has  accom- 
88 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

pHshed  deeds  worth  while,  Senator  Dolli- 
ver  is  forced  to  pay  tribute  to  the  influ- 
ence of  his  mother.  It  is  said  that  one 
of  the  essentials  of  the  far-seeing  young- 
ster on  fame  bent  is  to  select  most  care- 
fully the  maternal  parent.  Doubtless  in 
the  Dolliver  case  the  gods  were  kind. 
Whatever  the  cause  may  be,  we  find  the 
mother  Dolliver  a  woman  of  exceptional 
strength  of  character.  For  her  son  she 
was,  as  most  mothers  are,  optimistically 
ambitious.  She  imagined  a  great  career 
for  him,  but,  being  practical  in  her  dream- 
ing, she  went  a  step  farther  than  the  im- 
agining and  provided  more  materially  for 
the  realization  of  her  dream. 

Besides  endowing  her  son  with  those 
physical  attributes  that  in  Senate  days 
sent  him  over  the  more  silken  Senators 
of  regular  political  faith,  she  strength- 
ened his  mind  by  those  true  teachings 
89 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

that  spring,  seemingly  without  observing 
the  ordinary  laws  of  growth,  from  the 
innermost  being  of  the  mother  mind.  Not 
only  did  she  give  him  that  training  which 
later  made  for  what  may  be  called  great- 
ness, but  she  gave  him  at  birth  a  heritage 
that  environment  and  training  could  never 
supply.  And  then,  after  the  village  schools 
had  yielded  up  their  mental  harvest  for 
the  enrichment  of  the  Dolliver  brain 
granary,  this  mother  cut  corners  in  her 
housekeeping  arrangements  in  order  to 
save  the  money  needed  for  advancing  her 
son  still  farther  up  the  steps  leading  to 
the  temple  of  knowledge. 

From  the  Ringwood  school  we  find 
young  Dolliver  going  to  the  state  univer- 
sity at  Morgantown.  In  those  days  this 
university  was  but  little  more  than  a  semi- 
nary. It  was,  however,  the  best  offering 
that  presented  itself  that  would  match 
90 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

with  the  purse  of  the  minister's  son.  Cer- 
tain it  is  that  the  boy  here  made  much 
of  his  opportunities.  Undamned  with 
much  money  that  would  have  led  him 
from  the  paths  over  which  the  professors 
ever  seek  to  guide  the  stumbling  steps  of 
the  student,  young  Dolliver  had  little  to 
do  but  study.  Besides,  he  knew  that  at 
home  his  mother  was  making  sacrifices 
and  that  it  therefore  behooved  him  to  ac- 
quire as  much  knowledge  as  the  institu- 
tion would  permit  in  the  shortest  possible 
time.  So  well  did  he  work  that  we  find 
him  graduating  at  the  callow  age  of  sev- 
enteen. Then  came  the  Western  journey. 
To  lift  the  burden  from  the  maternal 
shoulders,  as  well  as  to  help  himself  up- 
ward toward  those  heights  which  he,  after 
his  mother's  pointing,  already  saw  clearly, 
Dolliver  left  the  mountains  and  migrated 
to  the  plains.  We  find  him  teaching  school 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

at  Victor  Center,  Illinois.  At  this  place  it 
had  for  years  been  the  custom  of  the  big 
boys  to  amuse  themselves  and  the  smaller 
pupils  by  engaging  in  that  ancient  rite 
known  as  "  licking  the  teacher."  History 
tells  us  that  the  custom  was  reversed  in 
this  Victor  Center  school  immediately  upon 
the  advent  of  one  Jonathan  Prentiss  Dol- 
liver.  It  is  also  a  matter  of  record  that 
never  before  did  the  pupils  make  such 
progress  along  learning's  path,  and  also 
that  the  teacher  never  found  it  necessary 
to  appeal  from  the  much  used  frontier 
law  that  might  makes  right.  He  was  able 
to  take  care  of  himself  even  before  he 
had  slipped  out  of  his  teens. 

Two  years  after  these  physical  and 
mental  triumphs  we  discover  our  South- 
erner carrying  away  the  legal  knowledge 
needed  for  the  practice  of  law.  During 
those  school  times  he  had  been  preparing 
92 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

himself  for  his  profession.  The  law  had 
been  chosen.  Thus  it  was  that  in  1878 
Fort  Dodge,  Iowa,  reached  out  and 
claimed  him  for  her  own,  arranging  mat- 
ters so  that  he  climbed  right  speedily  into 
local  prominence. 

Away  back  in  those  youthful  village 
school  times  it  was  admitted  by  all  know- 
ing persons  that  young  Dolliver  could  talk. 
It  is  related,  although  the  story  has  not 
been  properly  verified,  that  the  boy  came; 
across  a  copy  of  the  Congressional 
Record  and  was  carried  away  by  the  ora- 
torical offerings  therein  contained.  From 
the  same  source  one  learns  that  young 
Dolliver  made  up  his  mind  to  one  day  fill 
congressional  chambers  with  the  vibra- 
tions of  his  own  voice.  Be  this  true  or 
untrue,  it  is  certain  that  one  may  not 
trace  the  Dolliver  biography  far  to  the 
rear  without  finding  much  evidence  which 
93 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

compels  one  to  believe  that  a  well-defined 
path  was  followed. 

The  law  business  in  Fort  Dodge,  as  has 
been  related,  grew  and  prospered.  Young 
Dolliver  was  a  perfect  tornado  of  lan- 
guage. His  voice  was  ready  to  be  heard 
with  or  without  provocation.  He  was 
not  cursed  with  too  much  modesty  and 
waited  not  for  some  loiterer  to  upturn 
the  bushel  under  which  his  light  was 
hidden.  He  took  care  of  his  own  illumi- 
nations, letting  his  light  so  shine  as  to 
attract  the  attention  of  those  desirable 
folks  who  hold  in  their  hands  the  gifts 
of  offices.  It  happens  that  the  law  and 
politics  are  so  closely  allied  that  one  can 
scarcely  engage  in  the  first  without  at 
least  flirting  with  the  second. 

It  was  during  those  heated  times  around 
1884  when  Mr.  Elaine  hunted  the  White 
House  that  Jonathan  Prentiss  Dolliver 
94 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

first  stood  forth  bidding  for  the  gaze  of 
many  men.  He  made  speeches  from  every; 
unoccupied  stump  in  the  surrounding  ter- 
ritory, and  would  have  stood  high  with 
the  administration  of  Mr.  Elaine  had  not 
that  gentleman  been  defeated  by  a  foolish 
alliteration  of  "  Rum,  Romanism,  and 
Rebellion."  Mr.  Elaine  had  heard  Mr. 
Dolliver  speak  and  said  that  in  a  later 
day  Mr.  Dolliver  would  be  heard  from. 
Mr.  Elaine  has  been  proven  a  good 
prophet. 

After  the  Elaine  defeat  there  came  a 
wait  of  half  a  dozen  years  for  the  young 
lawyer.  This  was  not  bad.  It  gave  him 
opportunity  to  fill  his  mind  with  those 
enriching  facts  which  have  in  our  own 
day  been  used  with  such  telling  effect. 
In  1890,  when  he  was  elected  to  the 
House,  he  was  so  well  fitted  to  represent 
his  constituents  that  he  remained  a  repre- 
95 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

sentative  until  1901.  It  is  likely  that  he 
would  still  be  a  House  member  had  he  not 
in  1900  received  the  senatorial  chair  left 
vacant  by  the  death  of  Senator  J.  H. 
Gear.  This  appointment,  if  we  are  to 
be  exact,  came  on  August  23.  He  was 
elected  in  his  own  right  in  1902  and  again 
in  1907.  His  term  will,  therefore,  end  in 


He  entered  the  House  close  upon  the 
heels  of  the  McKinley  Bill  and  that  ex- 
travagant Congress  which  earned  for 
itself  the  title  of  "The  Billion  Dollar 
Congress/'  and  which  had  the  political 
effect  of  changing  the  congressional  com- 
plexion from  Republican  to  Democratic. 
This  placed  Mr.  Dolliver  with  the  minor- 
ity and  enabled  him  to  learn  the  Washing- 
ton game  without  being  forced  to  play  it 
to  his  own  cost.  After  four  years  of 
Democratic  rule  the  Republicans  once 
96 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

more  came  into  power  and  Mr.  Dolliver 
began  to  see  light  ahead. 

One  great  quality  this  big  Westerner 
possesses  which  has  stood  him  well  in 
times  gone  by,  —  he  knows  how  to  wait. 
Although  bulking  big  in  both  brain  and 
brawn,  Mr.  Dolliver  made  no  great  at- 
tempt to  wrest  the  control  of  things  out 
of  the  hands  of  the  oldsters  who  had  been 
in  Washington  for  twenty  years  or  more. 
He  waited  for  the  right  time  —  for  the 
time  when  his  offering  was  needed.  He 
looked  after  the  interests  of  his  constit- 
uents so  well  that  he  was  sent  back  five 
successive  times  —  surely  often  enough 
to  prove  that  in  his  own  district  he  was 
recognized  as  a  man  of  worth.  Had  he 
been  a  mere  machine  man,  it  is  likely 
that  he  would  have  been  knifed  by  some 
powerful  lieutenant  before  so  many  years 
had  slipped  by.  His  strength  was  proven 
97 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

in  the  House  days.  One  cannot  say  that 
what  he  did  was  dramatic,  but  his  record 
shows  that  he  was  steady,  dependable,  re- 
liable, sure. 

As  a  plain  man  of  the  people  he  re- 
ceived his  appointment  to  the  Senate. 
Back  of  him  stood  no  railroad,  and  no 
trust  contributed  Croesus-like  funds  to  his 
helpers.  He  did  not  take  his  election  and 
his  orders  from  special  interests.  He 
claimed  and  won  the  suffrage  of  his 
people  by- his  display  of  the  uncommon 
quality  of  common  sense  which  appeals 
to  the  broad-minded  Westerners.  His 
rise  was  steady  and  sure.  He  was  known 
as  a  regular  —  as  one  who  did  not  go 
too  far  ahead  of  his  party. 

It  was  not  until  the  late  insurgent 
unpleasantness  that  the  regular  Senator 
Dolliver  became  a  rampant  raging  insur- 
gent. And  even  then  he  was,  in  the  e^es 
98 


JONATHAN   PRENTISS    DOLLIVEK 

of  his  people,  a  regular.  To  them  his 
insurgency  was  regular  Republicanism. 
The  old  party  men  of  the  Cannon  and 
Aldrich  type  were  the  enemies  of  what 
is  regular. 

To  vote  "  No  "  to  the  Aldrich  Bill  took 
nerve  for  all  of  that.  Only  a  few  Repub- 
licans dared  do  it.  Only  those  who  were 
the  real  representatives  could  do  it.  Those 
who  were  shackled  to  special  interests 
dared  do  nothing  but  obey  the  commands 
that  came  from  the  Aldrich-Cannon  camp. 
Dolliver  was  not  one  of  these. 

Senator  Dolliver  is  one  of  the  truly 
great  men  of  Iowa.  He  is  big  in  body 
and  big  in  brain.  With  the  wide  prairie 
vision  he  sees  all  things.  He  is  not  a 
local  man  in  the  narrow  sense,  as  so  many 
of  our  New  England  representatives  are 
likely  to  be,  but  works  for  the  best  in- 
terests of  the  whole  country.  Like  the 
99 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

rest  of  his  brothers  in  the  insurgent  ranks, 
he  is  without  wealth.  His  home  in  Fort 
Dodge  is  unpretentious  but  comfortable. 
He  was  married  to  Miss  Louise  Pearsons 
on  November  20,  1895,  and  is  the  father 
of  three  children.  He  is  a  lecturer  of 
proven  power,  a  helper  of  young  men,  a 
lawyer  of  much  ability,  and  always  has 
the  power  to  see  the  funny  side  of  things. 
From  the  standpoint  of  steadiness  he  is, 
perhaps,  the  best  leader  in  the  insurgent 
ranks.  He  does  not  irritate.  He  has  the 
power  to  make  and  hold  friends.  Even 
his  opponents  do  not  hate  him  with  that 
undying  hatred  inspired  by  some  of  his 
colleagues.  In  the  Senate  his  great  bulk, 
his  great  voice,  and  his  great  mind  fit  him 
to  take  a  place  far  ahead  of  those  silken 
representatives  of  Plutocratic  Interests 
who  must  remain  chained  to  their  corpo- 
ration kennels.  Senator  Dolliver  may 

100 


JONATHAN    PRENTISS    DOLLIVER 

roam  abroad  and  acquire  for  himself  the 
help  that  is  forever  being  offered  to 
those  whose  only  desire  is  to  serve  the 
majority.  Senator  Dolliver  is  a  servant 
of  the  many. 


101 


ALBERT   J,   BEVERIDGE 


ALBERT  J.   BEVERIDGE 


ALBERT   J.    BEVERIDGE 

WHEN  Albert  J.  Beveridge,  as  the 
head  of  his  own  personally  con- 
structed and  personally  conducted  politi- 
cal machine,  secured  for  himself  the 
election  to  the  United  States  Senate,  a 
newspaper  reporter  sent  into  the  state 
to  see  for  himself  what  was  really  hap- 
pening found  that  the  Beveridge  adher- 
ents were  not  mere  enthusiasts,  but  were 
as  fanatical  in  their  loyalty  as  those 
followers  of  Mahomet  who,  at  the  mere 
command  of  their  leader,  flung  themselves 
into  the  ditches  before  Constantinople  so 
that  their  fellows  might  march  over  their 
bodies  to  victory. 

It  is  always   somewhat   dangerous   to 
indulge  in  the  joy  of  weaving  a  long  sen- 
105 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

tence,  but  when  the  sentence  is  started 
with  the  name  of  Senator  Beveridge  and 
ends  with  victory,  it  matters  little  how 
many  literary  bypaths  one  must  travel  to 
reach  the  period. 

As  one  when  given  the  segment  of  a 
circle  may  complete  the  circle,  so  one  may, 
by  being  given  a  segment  of  the  youthful 
biography  of  a  man,  construct  a  fairly 
perfect  circle  of  the  man's  life. 

Beveridge,  like  most  of  those  insurging 
gentlemen  who  have  achieved  their  suc- 
cess as  champions  of  popular  government, 
found  himself  as  a  youth  equipped  with  a 
plentiful  stock  of  poverty.  His  father 
had  tried  to  support  his  family  on  a  poor 
sort  of  a  farm  on  the  border  of  Adams 
and  Highland  counties  in  Ohio.  There,; 
on  October  6,  1862,  Albert  J.  was  born. 
The  father  and  brothers  fought  on  the 
Union  side  in  the  Civil  War,  after  which 
1 06 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

unpleasantness  a  new  home  was  found  in 
Illinois. 

It  matters  little  whether  a  young  man 
be  equipped  or  unequipped  with  material 
wealth,  but  it  matters  much  what  wealth  is 
stored  in  his  mind  and  body.  If  judged  by 
the  standards  set  by  Dun  and  Bradstreet, 
Beveridge  was  worse  than  bankrupt.  His 
poverty  was  like  that  encountered  by  Bris- 
tow  in  his  youth.  It  was  that  stinging 
kind  that  whipped  him  like  a  lash  and 
drove  him  out  to  work.  It  rilled  his  soul 
with  such  terrors  that  he  flung  himself 
feverishly  into  labor  that  would  purchase 
comforts.  And  yet  this  poverty  was  a 
good  thing.  The  law  of  compensation  will 
persist  in  working.  There  is  no  greater 
developer  of  character  than  doing  the 
work  involved  in  earning  a  living.  Not 
only  is  this  proven  by  Beveridge,  but  a 
study  of  the  biographies  of  others  ,who 
107 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

have  climbed  high  from  great  depths  will 
disclose  this  same  fact.  The  youth  who  is 
flung  into  the  stream  and  left  to  sink  or 
swim  will,  if  there  be  the  ghost  of  man- 
hood in  him,  swim  in  safety  to  the  nearest 
shore.  Beveridge  was  tossed  into  the 
stream  of  life  by  the  clawing  hands  of 
Poverty. 

At  twelve  he  was  a  farm  laborer  and 
followed  the  plow.  Work  in  a  railroad 
crew  claimed  him  two  years  later.  We 
find  him  in  a  lumber  camp  at  fifteen,  driv- 
ing team  and  using  his  glorious  young 
strength  in  handling  heavy  walnut  logs. 
A  year  later  he  showed  his  genius  for 
managing  men  as  foreman  of  the  camp 
—  a  mere  boy  bossing  men  old  enough  to 
be  his  father.  And  always  we  find  him 
studying  —  preparing  himself  for  some- 
thing better. 

Manual  labor  claimed  him  all  summer 
108 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

and  late  into  the  fall.  Then,  with  a  wee 
bit  of  money  saved  up,  he  went  to  school. 
He  worked  his  way  through  high  school 
in  this  way,  his  great  physical  strength 
developed  by  manual  labor  fitting  him  for 
the  ravenous  way  in  which  he  studied  to 
satisfy  his  mental  hunger.  Working  with 
his  hands  and  thinking  while  he  worked 
had  cleared  his  mind.  His  brain  was  like 
a  sun-parched  desert  in  a  rain-storm.  He 
drank  in  knowledge  and  retained  it. 

Without  money,  except  for  fifty  dollars 
which  a  kind  old  man  in  his  home  town 
loaned  him,  he  entered  De  Pauw  Univer- 
sity at  Greencastle,  Indiana.  David  Gra- 
ham Phillips,  the  author,  was  a  fellow 
student.  Phillips  says  that  in  those  days 
Beveridge  was  different  from  the  rest  of 
the  fellows.  He  was  odd.  He  was  a 
rather  short,  heavy-set  youngster,  his 
well-developed  muscles  playing  beneath  a 
109 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

baggy  suit.  His  face  was  somewhat  pal- 
lid, but  keen  and  alert.  His  gray-blue 
eyes  looked  out  from  under  a  big  mop  of 
long,  fair  hair.  His  voice  was  penetrat- 
ing, one  that  could  be  heard  above  the 
roar  of  a  stream  and  logs  that  crashed 
into  one  another.  It  was  a  voice  that  com- 
pelled one  to  listen.  It  irritated  one  until 
one  became  accustomed  to  it. 

Seeing  Beveridge,  or  meeting  him  for 
the  first  time,  one  would  be  inclined  to  dis- 
like him,  not  because  there  was  about  him 
something  that  aroused  dislike,  but  be- 
cause he  was  odd  and  not  easily  classified. 
After  one  knew  him  one  could  not  help 
liking  and  admiring  him. 

In  college  he  was  known  as  the  greatest 
worker  and  the  wisest  loafer  in  the  place. 
The  schedule  of  study  he  had  arranged 
for  himself  would  have  killed  any  ordi- 
nary man.  He  limited  himself  to  four 
no 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

hours  of  sleep  a  night,  taking  more  sleep 
as  many  a  student  would  take  some  ordi- 
nary form  of  college  recreation. 

But  this  does  not  mean  that  Beveridge 
was  a  "  grind  " ;  that  is,  he  was  not  one 
of  those  stoop-shouldered,  bespectacled, 
narrow-chested  fellows  who  win  scholas- 
tic honors  and  then  get  a  job  in  a  corner 
grocery  or  die  of  consumption.  Beveridge 
had  just  as  much  fun  as  the  rest  of  his 
fellows.  The  difference  consisted  in  this:' 
after  the  prank  was  past  Beveridge  would 
settle  down  to  his  work,  while  the  others 
would  gather  together  and  talk  about  the 
fun  they  had  had. 

He  was  a  good  executive,  a  good  organ- 
izer. He  owned  but  one  thing  in  those 
days,  and  that  one  thing  he  invested  so  as 
to  earn  for  himself  the  largest  returns. 
Time  was  his  one  capital.  He  wasted  no 
minutes.  When  he  worked,  he  worked; 
in 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

when  he  played,  he  played.  He  never 
dawdled.  It  used  to  be  a  cause  of  wonder 
to  his  mates  when  he  disposed  of  his 
school  work  and  then  stepped  in  and  ran 
the  politics  of  his  fraternity  and  the  liter- 
ary society  to  which  he  belonged.  Mr. 
Phillips  says  that  often  he  has  seen  Bev- 
eridge  going  off  into  the  woods  in  the 
morning  to  practice  speaking  before  the 
rest  of  the  students  were  astir. 

It  is  little  wonder  that  he  won  about  all 
the  college  oratorical  prizes.  He  worked 
for  them  harder  than  any  one  else.  While 
he  had  native  ability,  he  had  something  in 
addition  which  others  did  not  possess.  He 
had  perseverance,  patience,  and  stick-to- 
it-iveness.  It  was  good  business  for  him 
to  win  prizes.  He  needed  the  money  to 
pay  his  expenses.  In  his  junior  year  he 
brought  to  De  Pauw  the  state  oratorical 
prize,  defeating  speakers  from  all  the  big 
112 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

colleges  in  Indiana,  The  coveted  inter- 
state oratorical  prize  became  his  in  his 
senior  year.  He  had  to  compete  with  the 
best  orators  of  the  great  colleges  of  the 
Middle  West  and  Northwest.  The  news 
of  his  victory  set  his  fellows  aflame  with 
enthusiasm.  At  the  depot  to  meet  him  on 
his  return  he  found  the  president  and  fac- 
ulty, the  band,  his  cheering  fellow  stu- 
dents, and  an  equally  enthusiastic  crowd 
of  townspeople.  One  who  was  present 
says  that  "  Bev  "  tried  to  ride  in  that  spe- 
cial carriage  by  the  side  of  the  president 
without  showing  his  self-consciousness, 
but  that  every  one  forgave  him  his  fail- 
ure to  hide  his  feeling  of  importance. 

During  his  first  vacation  he  went  out  to 
earn  money  as  a  book  agent.  He  was  so 
successful  that  the  company  gave  him 
charge  of  training  a  special  students  sales 
force  the  following  year.  The  book  was 
113 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

a  history  of  religions  and  was  called 
"  Error's  Chains/'  For  months  before 
school  closed  this  force  of  persuasive 
gentlemen  rattled  around  Greencastle 
practicing  for  the  summer  campaign.  It 
is  reported  that  no  college  crew  sold  more 
books  or  made  more  money  than  the  one 
led  by  Beveridge  that  second  summer. 
Every  sitting-room  table  was  thereafter 
qualified  to  pass  any  kind  of  an  examina- 
tion in  the  history  of  religions. 

After  graduation  the  publishers  tried 
their  best  to  make  Beveridge  a  permanent 
member  of  their  force.  But  he  refused 
their  offer,  even  though  he  needed  the 
money  as  he  needed  few  other  things.  His 
health  was  broken  by  the  years  of  study- 
ing and  the  strain  of  earning  a  living.  To 
get  back  his  health  was  his  first  task.  This 
he  accomplished  by  going  West  and  be- 
coming a  cowboy.  When  he  returned 
114 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

East,  he  entered  the  law  office  of  McDon- 
ald &  Butler  of  Indianapolis  as  clerk.  Old 
Senator  McDonald  was  interested  in  the 
youngster  and  believed  in  him.  A  year  ; 
later  the  old  man  called  him  in  and  told 
him  he  was  appointed  managing  clerk. 

"  But  I  have  n't  the  necessary  experi- 
ence," exclaimed  Beveridge. 

"That's  all  right,  Albert,"  answered 
the  old  attorney;  "if  we  are  willing  to 
take  a  chance,  you  should  be." 

This  really  made  the  youngster  a  junior 
partner  and  threw  him  actively  into  the 
practice  of  his  profession.  His  legal  op- 
ponents were  big  men.  But  Beveridge 
himself,  in  spite  of  his  youth,  was  poten- 
tially a  big  man.  The  power  of  his  intel- 
lect and  the  force  of  his  personality  were 
felt.  It  was  right  in  the  midst  of  a  big 
trial  that  the  date  set  for  his  marriage  fell. 
So  well  liked  was  the  youth  that  the  judge 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

gladly  closed  the  court  so  that  the  mar- 
riage might  go  on  as  planned.  Thus,  on 
November  24,  1887,  two  years  after  his 
graduation  from  De  Pauw,  he  was 
married  to  Miss  Katherine  Langsdale,  a 
classmate.  Mrs.  Beveridge  died  June  18, 
1900.  Seven  years  later  in  Berlin,  Ger- 
many, on  August  7,  Senator  Beveridge 
was  married  to  Miss  Katherine  Eddy  of 
Chicago. 

His  first  great  legal  victory  was  in  what 
is  known  as  the  Pennsylvania  cases.  The 
Pennsylvania  Railroad  contended  that  the 
state  of  Indiana  had  no  right  to  tax  prop- 
erty not  owned  in  the  state.  Beveridge 
fought  this  case  through  and  won  a 
signal  victory  for  Indiana  by  placing 
one  hundred  and  fifty  million  dollars' 
worth  of  railroad  property  on  its  tax 
rolls.  Although  interested  chiefly  in  civil 
cases,  Beveridge  would  sometimes  break 
;n6 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

his   rule   and  do   work   in   the   criminal 
court. 

It  was  during  the  great  Elaine  cam- 
paign in  1884  that  Beveridge  made  his 
first  political  speeches.  Thus  he  became 
identified  with  politics  a  year  before  his 
graduation  from  college.  From  that  time 
on  he  never  lost  his  interest  in  the  govern- 
ment, although  he  made  no  attempt  to 
secure  political  office  for  himself.  He 
studied  the  political  situation  and  found 
that  the  machine  in  his  state  was  about  as 
corrupt  a  thing  as  could  be  discovered  in 
the  country.  He  then  set  out  to  break  the 
machine  power.  To  do  this  he  organized 
his  own  machine,  forming  it  out  of  the 
young  men.  Here  he  displayed  his  genius 
for  organization.  These  young  voters  he 
welded  together  so  that  nothing  could  pull 
them  apart.  Year  after  year  they  grew  in 
strength.  Year  after  year  they  made  their 
117 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

power  felt.  Finally,  in  1899,  they  placed 
their  leader  in  a  chair  in  the  United  States 
Senate,  giving  him  his  first  and  only  office. 
According  to  the  all-wise  Mr.  Dooley, 
Beveridge's  first  Senate  speech  was  "  wan 
you  cud  waltz  to."  It  won  him  the  nick- 
name of  "  the  boy  orator."  Coming  from 
the  youngest  member,  it  aroused  the  old- 
sters to  attempt  to  kill  him  off,  to  smother 
him,  to  snub  him,  to  put  him  in  what  they 
in  their  godlike  wisdom  thought  was  his 
place.  But  nothing  could  stop  Beveridge. 
He  remained  the  same  buoyant,  fresh,  and 
bubbling  speaker.  When  he  arose  to  talk, 
the  ladies  crowded  into  the  galleries.  He 
was  a  hero  to  the  women.  But  many  of 
the  older  men  disliked  him.  Senator  Pet- 
tus,  with  more  than  eighty  years  behind 
him,  once  arose  and  delivered  a  speech 
which  was  such  a  farcical  imitation  of  a 
regulation  Beveridge  offering  that  the 
;n8 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

Senate  was  convulsed  with  laughter.  But 
that  laughter  affected  Beveridge  about  as 
much  as  a  gentle  shower  would  affect  a 
duck.  He  could  not  be  squelched. 

Yet  only  those  who  did  not  know  the 
man  disliked  him.  Newspaper  men  who 
came  to  the  capital  prepared  to  dislike  him 
went  away  with  a  feeling  of  admiration 
and  personal  liking.  They  recognized  the 
real  man  in  him.  His  seriousness,  his 
mannerisms,  his  Samuel  Smiles  preach- 
ments—  all  these  were  forgotten  in  the 
sunshine  of  his  man-like  presence.  And 
then  he  was  a  man  of  intellect.  Those 
who  engaged  him  in  debate  with  the  hope 
of  easily  trampling  upon  him  found  too 
late  that  he  was  a  master.  More  than  once 
has  Senator  Bailey  been  driven  frantic  by 
the  querulous  questioning.  To  debate  suc- 
cessfully with  Beveridge  one  must  know 
all  about  the  subject  in  hand  and  a  little  bit 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

more.  Beveridge,  like  a  battleship  in  war 
time,  always  has  his  decks  cleared  for 
action. 

Few  men  have  gone  to  Washington  with 
more  enthusiasm.  It  was  his  enthusiasm, 
his  fire,  his  serious  and  insistent  activity, 
that  the  old  fellows  could  not  understand. 
Besides,  he  was  guilty  of  the  crime  of 
being  young.  To  most  folks  wisdom  is 
synonymous  with  age.  Those  old  politi- 
cians in  Washington  could  not  see  that 
Beveridge  had  made  up  in  intensity  and 
variety  what  he  lacked  in  years.  As  a 
man  may  more  easily  learn  golf  by  study- 
ing the  principles  governing  every  stroke 
instead  of  going  out  and  hitting  the  ball 
all  over  the  lot  without  using  his  head,  so 
Beveridge  studied  politics  and  government 
scientifically  and  basically,  while  others 
were  trusting  to  time  and  experience  to 
give  them  their  training.  That  is  why  he 

120 


ALBERT    J.    BEVERIDGE 

has  remained  in  the  Senate,  his  position 
practically  unchallenged,  since  1899. 

From  his  pictures  one  would  judge  Sen- 
ator Beveridge  to  Be  tall.  In  height,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  he  measures  but  five  feet 
eight  inches.  His  weight  is  one  hundred 
and  fifty-eight  pounds.  He  still  has  that 
boyish  look  and  has  not  lost  his  old  bubbly 
enthusiasm  or  his  buoyancy.  His  books 
show  him  to  be  more  than  a  politician. 
His  knowledge  is  not  limited  to  facts  about 
this  country.  He  has  browsed  in  his 
studies  over  the  entire  world.  During  the 
Russo-Japanese  War  a  series  of  articles 
in  a  magazine  showed  his  grasp  of  the 
Eastern  situation.  His  books  written  to 
help  young  men  may  be  found  in  nearly  all 
the  libraries  of  the  country. 

That  he  is  a  man  with  a  heart  is  proved 
by  his  attitude  toward  the  child-labor 
question.  He  has  fought  consistently  to 

121. 


-     HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

save  the  children  from  wage  slavery  an3 
give  them  the  play  and  the  education  which 
he  himself  lacked  in  his  youth.  His  speech 
on  the  work  of  Frances  Willard  stamps 
him  as  a  man  who  loves  and  understands 
women.  His  articles  on  the  Bible  show 
his  broadness  and  the  wholesomeness  of 
him,  while  his  stand  on  all  public  questions 
is  proof  of  the  fact  that  he  understands 
what  the  people  want  and  of  his  desire  to 
serve  their  best  interests. 

Senator  Beveridge  became  a  good  man 
first,  and,  as  is  natural,  he  could  not  and 
has  not  failed  to  be  a  good  Senator.  Esti- 
mating him  as  an  all-around  man,  he  must 
be  graded  close  to  one  hundred  per  cent. 


122 


VICTOR  MURDOCK 


VICTOR  MURDOCK 


.VICTOR   MURDOCK 

TN  spite  of  his  shock  of  red  hair,  his 
"••  reputation  as  a  fighting  insurgent,  his 
two  hundred  and  ten  pounds,  his  broad 
shoulders  and  deep  chest,  the  keenest  de- 
sire of  Victor  Murdock's  life  is  not  to 
win  a  place  for  himself  as  a  statesman  or 
politician,  but  to  write  one  successful  play 
or  a  book  that  will  live  after  he  is  gone. 

He  can  think  of  no  joy  keener  than  that 
which  comes  to  a  man  who  has  written  a 
successful  play  and  stands  before  a  howl- 
ing, cheering,  enthusiastic  mob  in  response 
to  wild  calls  for  the  author.  That  he  has 
become  known  in  every  state  in  the  union 
as  a  fighter  for  popular  government,  and 
is  looked  upon  everywhere  as  an  uncom- 
promising enemy  of  the  machine  governed 
125 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

by  concentrated  wealth,  is  a  matter  of  as 
much  surprise  to  him  as  it  is  to  those  who 
know  of  his  literary  ambition. 

When  a  boy  he  was  not  particularly 
interested  in  politics.  Unlike  Bristow,  he 
did  not  choose  a  political  career.  Even 
in  his  boyhood  days  his  dream  was  of  lit- 
erary instead  of  political  conquests.  When 
he  was  ten  years  old,  he  was  trying  to 
write  plays  that  would  relegate  Shake- 
speare to  the  amateur  class.  As  soon  as 
he  was  old  enough  he  helped  around  his 
father's  printshop,  and  at  fifteen  was  earn- 
ing a  salary  as  a  reporter. 

During  his  boyhood  he  read  everything 
that  he  felt  would  form  his  style.  He  did 
not  have  to  be  driven  away  from  the  five- 
cent  novels,  because  he  was  so  serious  in 
his  ambition  that  he  refused  to  contami- 
nate his  literary  equipment  with  reading 
that  did  not  measure  up  to  the  highest 
126 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

standard.  Like  many  another  literary 
person,  he  took  himself  and  his  writing 
very  seriously.  His  world  was  a  very 
small  one,  in  spite  of  his  newspaper  work, 
and  he  had  visions  of  going  forth  and 
tossing  it  about  as  other  youngsters  did 
a  rag  ball  on  the  town  lot. 

Kipling,  as  Murdock  insisted  on  think- 
ing, was  famous  at  twenty-three.  Chat- 
terton  had  earned  the  title  of  "  that  mar- 
velous boy  "  when  he  was  little  more  than 
a  child.  Shelley  and  Keats  had  written 
their  names  imperishably  when  they  had 
scarcely  trembled  past  their  teens.  Mur- 
dock burned  to  emulate  them,  to  write 
something  that  would  stir  men's  souls 
like  organ  chords. 

With  the  irresponsibility  of  genius  he 

was  married  before  he  was  twenty.    Miss 

M.  P.  Allen  was  the  daring  maiden  who 

believed  in  him  and  in  his  dreams.     At 

127 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

that  time  he  could  not  be  entered  at  any 
county  fair  as  a  malefactor  of  great 
wealth.  His  father,  on  whose  paper  he 
worked  as  reporter,  paid  him  only  nine 
dollars  a  week.  $\fter  his  marriage  he 
went  to  his  father  and  pointed  out,  in 
what  he  thought  was  a  businesslike  man- 
ner, the  necessity  for  having  more  money. 

"  You  are  paying  your  bookkeeper 
twenty-two  dollars  a  week,  while  I,  a  lit- 
erary man,  am  forced  to  support  myself 
and  wife  on  nine  paltry  dollars.  It  is  n't 
fair."  So  argued  Victor. 

His  father,  however,  was  of  a  different 
opinion.  He  was  perfectly  willing  to  as- 
sist Victor  as  a  son,  but  as  a  reporter  on 
his  paper  he  could  not  figure  out  that 
good  business  demanded  the  payment  of 
more  than  nine  dollars.  He  kindly  and 
patiently  and  painstakingly  pointed  out  to 
Victor  that  the  bookkeeper  was  a  man  of 
128 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

parts,  a  necessity,  a  valuable  servant,  that 
it  would  be  difficult  to  get  another  like 
him,  while  reporters  could  be  picked  up 
by  the  gross  in  any  village  in  the  country. 

Thinking  that  his  literary  abilities  were 
not  rated  high  enough  in  the  Wichita 
market,  the  young  couple  journeyed  to 
Chicago,  arranged  their  few  belongings 
in  one  room,  prayed  to  the  gods  that 
watch  over  the  destinies  of  literary  per- 
sons, and  then  Victor  went  out  and  got 
a  job  on  a  newspaper  that  paid  him  twenty- 
two  dollars  a  week  at  the  start,  not  count- 
ing, of  course,  such  expenses  as  a  reporter 
meets  with  in  the  performance  of  his 
duties.  The  imagination  of  the  reader 
may  be  trusted  to  picture  the  glee  of  the 
son  as  he  sat  himself  down  to  write  a 
letter  to  his  father. 

On  the  Chicago  papers  Murdock  made 
good.  He  not  only  held  his  initial  posi- 
129 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

tion  as  long  as  he  wanted  it,  but  climbed 
ahead  into  positions  that  paid  more  money 
and  enabled  him  to  do  more  important 
work.  Fate  played  a  merry  jest  upon  him 
when  he  was  assigned  to  political  duty. 
He  had  always  hated  politics,  but  the  duty 
of  a  reporter  is  to  perform  all  duties  as- 
signed him  without  question,  and  Murdock 
shouldered  political  burdens  as  though  it 
were  a  pleasure. 

He  not  only  saw  the  working  of  local 
politics  through  the  eyes  of  a  reporter, 
but  met  and  associated  with  big  men  in 
the  world  of  government.  For  his  paper 
he  traveled  with  William  McKinley,  and 
learned  to  love  the  man  for  his  innate 
goodness  and  gentleness  even  before  he 
attained  national  prominence.  In  1894 
his  father  gladly  welcomed  him  home  to 
Wichita,  and  he  became  managing  editor 
of  "The  Wichita  Eagle/'  holding  that 
130 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

position  until  1903,  when  he  was  elected 
to  the  Fifty-eighth  Congress  to  fill  a 
vacancy. 

His  first  splurge  into  politics  as  a  can- 
didate was  made  with  as  little  prepara- 
tion on  his  part  as  his  initial  plunge  into 
political  reporting.  There  were  eighteen 
candidates  for  the  office  of  Congressman 
when  the  foreman  of  "  The  Daily  Eagle," 
Murdock's  mother,  and  other  intimate 
friends  and  relatives  asked  him  why  he 
did  not  try  for  the  place.  He  refused 
to  consider  it.  But  the  friends  would  not 
take  no  for  an  answer.  A  family  confer- 
ence was  called,  and  all  voted  in  favor  of 
the  Murdock  candidacy.  In  opposition, 
standing  out  alone  like  the  Rock  of 
Gibraltar,  was  Murdock's  father.  "  How 
any  man  is  fool  enough  to  leave  the  office 
of  a  paper  which  speaks  daily  to  thou- 
sands of  readers,  in  order  to  become  a 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

picayunish  Congressman,  is  something  I 
don't  pretend  to  understand.  The  editor 
of  a  daily  paper  is  a  bigger  man  any  old 
day  than  any  Congressman  that  was  ever 
foaled."  That  was  the  paternal  verdict. 

Victor,  however,  went  with  the  major- 
ity, announced  his  candidacy,  and,  to  his 
own  surprise,  won  the  appointment.  He 
went  to  Congress  without  any  idea  of 
posing  as  a  reformer.  His  attitude  was 
that  of  a  newspaper  man  instead  of  that 
of  a  statesman  or  politician.  He  really 
was  not  interested  particularly  in  any- 
thing but  the  news  value  of  what  he  saw. 

What  he  did  see  interested  him.  He 
saw  that  Congressmen,  for  the  most  part, 
are  mere  puppets,  that  a  ring  ruled  the 
place,  that  the  Speaker  was  an  autocrat, 
that  no  one  could  speak  without  begging 
for  the  privilege,  and  then  only  after  tell- 
ing in  advance  what  was  to  be  the  sub- 
132 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

ject  of  the  speech.  Murdock  saw  all  these 
things  and  more.  For  himself  he  was  not 
indignant.  Rather  was  his  indignation 
that  of  a  newspaper  man  who  is  inter- 
ested more  in  getting  a  good  story  than 
in  bringing  about  a  reform.  The  reform 
comes  second. 

Murdock  wrote  a  story  that  was  a 
stinger.  Before  sending  it,  however,  he 
showed  it  to  the  political  leader  of  his 
state,  then  in  the  Senate.  He  was  advised 
to  tear  the  story  up,  become  a  good  In- 
dian, and  remain  mentally  hobbled  on 
the  reservation.  Being  unused  to  Wash- 
ington and  relying  somewhat  upon  the 
advice  of  his  political  superior,  the  story 
found  its  way  into  the  wastebasket.  For 
several  years  he  remained  a  good  Indian. 
Then,  since  he  had  been  appointed  to  the 
Postal  Committee,  he  discovered  what  he 
thought  was  a  mere  error  in  bookkeeping. 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

He  remembered  what  his  father  had  told 
him  about  the  importance  of  bookkeepers, 
and  he  thought  that  he  might  perform  a 
real  service  by  pointing  out  the  mistake. 

Up  to  1878  no  mail  had  been  carried 
on  the  railroads  on  Sunday.  The  rail- 
roads were  paid  for  hauling  the  mail  by 
the  weight  of  the  mail  carried.  This 
weight  was  arrived  at  by  weighing  the 
mails  for  six  days  and  then  dividing  the 
total  by  six  so  as  to  get  the  daily  aver- 
age. The  next  step  was  to  multiply  the 
daily  weight  by  the  number  of  days  — 
counting  six  to  the  week  —  in  the  mail- 
hauling  year. 

That  was  all  right  up  to  1878.  But 
after  that  mail  was  hauled  on  Sunday. 
The  divisor,  however,  remained  the  same. 
Murdock  pointed  out  that  the  divisor 
should  be  seven.  No  attention  was  paid 
to  him.  He  insisted  that  a  mistake  had 
134 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

been  made.  His  insistence  forced  the 
matter  into  public  notice.  Then,  and  not 
until  then,  did  he  learn  that  there  was  no 
mistake  in  bookkeeping,  but  that  for  years 
government  officials  had  been  sharing  in 
the  graft.  After  a  strenuous  fight  the 
divisor  was  made  seven,  and  Murdock 
felt  a  certain  thrill  of  pride  over  knowing 
that  his  discovery  had  saved  the  govern- 
ment about  five  million  dollars  a  year. 

That  awakened  him  to  the  evil  in  gov- 
ernment affairs,  and  so  he  was  prepared 
to  take  his  place  among  the  leaders  of  the 
congressional  insurgents  during  the  late 
congressional  session.  He  voted  against 
the  Aldrich-Payne  bill  all  the  time,  and 
was  a  sworn  enemy  of  Speaker  Cannon 
and  that  kind  of  congressional  domina- 
tion known  as  Cannonism. 

Murdock  was  born  on  March  18,  1871, 
in  Burlingame,  Kansas,  and  has  always 
135 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

lived  in  the  state  except  during  his  repor- 
torial  period  in  Chicago.  His  education 
was  received  in  the  common  schools  and 
at  Lewis  Academy,  Wichita,  but  the  best 
training  came  through  his  newspaper 
work  and  because  of  his  keen  desire  to 
write  something  that  would  live.  Mrs. 
Murdock  has  always  been  his  helper  and 
his  pard,  while  two  daughters  have  come 
to  brighten  their  home. 

To  all  but  those  who  hate  insurgents, 
Victor  Murdock  is  likable,  being  gifted 
with  a  certain  insinuating  charm  of  man- 
ner that  wins  confidence.  His  newspaper 
work  has  trained  him  to  see  that  which 
is  hidden  from  the  majority.  He  knows 
much  of  the  crookedness  of  politics,  yet 
in  spite  of  this  knowledge  he  is  an  op- 
timist through  and  through.  He  has  a 
big  mouth  through  which  to  send  forth 
a  pleasing  oratorical  voice,  and  there  is 
136 


VICTOR    MURDOCK 

that  about  him  which  impresses  one  with 
his  solidity  and  general  wholesomeness. 
He  has  fought  against  Cannonism,  not 
for  personal  glory  or  for  a  higher  office, 
but  because  he  believes  that  it  is  the  only 
thing  for  an  honest  representative  of  the 
people  to  do. 

If  he  had  his  own  way,  political  posi- 
tions would  be  forgotten,  and  he  would 
settle  down  to  his  newspaper  work  with 
a  sigh  of  content,  and  would  work  to 
materialize  that  dream  of  his  which  calls 
for  the  writing  of  a  successful  play  that 
will  call  forth  the  frantic  cheers  of  the 
crowd  and  the  wild  cry  for  "  The  author ! 
author ! " 


137 


MILES    POINDEXTER 


MILES  POINDEXTER 


MILES    POINDEXTER 

OENT  to  Congress  on  a  well-advertised 
^  anti-Cannon  promise,  Miles  Poindex- 
ter  violated  all  the  sacred  rules  governing 
precedent  by  becoming  a  national  figure 
during  his  first  term.  He  represented  a 
district  containing  thirty  thousand  square 
miles,  which  embraces  the  eastern  half  of 
the  state  of  Washington,  and  his  was  the 
first  Western  fight  in  which  Cannonism 
was  the  main  issue.  The  only  promise 
asked  by  his  constituents  was  that  he  fight 
against  the  Cannon  rule.  How  well  he 
obeyed  is  a  matter  of  national  record.  He 
speedily  took  his  place  as  a  leader  in  the 
counsels  of  the  insurgents,  and  was  an 
important  and  powerful  influence  in  giv- 
141 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

ing  the  Speaker  his  first  rude  shove  to  the 
rear. 

Miles  Poindexter  was  born  in  Memphis, 
Tennessee,  three  years  after  the  close  of 
the  Civil  War.  His  warrior  blood  comes 
from  his  father,  who  proudly  wore  the 
gray  in  the  great  conflict.  He  attended 
the  Fancy  Hill  Academy  in  Virginia,  and 
later  was  graduated  from  Washington 
and  Lee  University,  carrying  off  class 
honors. 

Like  the  course  of  empire  of  which  the 
poet  sings,  he  took  his  Western  journey. 
He  was  then  twenty-three  years  old. 
This,  for  the  information  of  those  hungry 
for  figures,  was  in  1891.  He  was  equipped 
to  practice  law,  but  if  his  mental  condition 
had  been  as  unfinished  as  his  physical  ap- 
pearance, his  path  would  have  been  down- 
ward instead  of  in  the  opposite  and,  as 
folks  contend,  the  better  direction.  For 
142 


MILES    POINDEXTER 

he  was  a  gawky,  ungainly,  elongated  sort 
of  individual,  whose  chief  occupation 
seemed  to  be  to  find  a  place  for  his  feet 
and  hands.  Pendleton,  Oregon,  was  his 
first  home.  There  he  demonstrated  that, 
in  spite  of  his  un-Gibsonlike  appearance, 
he  was  a  veritable  Apollo  in  beauty  and 
strength  of  mind. 

Like  Damon  and  Pythias,  two  ancient 
history,  or,  if  you  prefer,  mythical  charac- 
ters whose  business  was  to  impersonate 
manly  friendship,  Miles  Poindexter  and 
Tom  Page  drifted  together.  Walla  Walla, 
which  is  not  far  from  Pendleton,  was  the 
home  of  the  mother  and  sisters  of  Tom 
Page,  who  used  to  ride  over  every  Sunday 
morning  for  midday  gustatory  purposes, 
as  well  as  for  that  spiritual  and  mental 
enrichment  which  is  supposed  to  be  found 
among  the  winnings  of  a  son  who  fre- 
quents the  neighborhood  of  his  mother 
143 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

and  sisters.  One  Sunday  Poindexter  was 
persuaded  to  go  along.  That  is  how  he 
met  Elizabeth  Gale  Page,  who  brightened 
his  life  by  marrying  him  not  so  many 
months  later. 

Pendleton  had  grown  too  small  for  the 
ambitious  young  lawyer,  and  Walla  Walla 
became  his  home  for  six  years,  while  he 
stepped  up  to  the  prosecuting  attorneyship 
of  the  county.  After  the  Walla  Walla 
period,  or,  to  bound  this  with  time,  thirteen 
years  ago,  he  moved  to  Spokane  and  for 
six  years  was  deputy  prosecuting  attorney. 
He  was  next  elected  to  the  superior  bench 
as  joint  judge  of  two  counties.  Here  he 
made  a  splendid  record.  His  decisions 
had  in  them  so  much  of  the  element  of 
justice.  Back  of  all  of  them  were  years 
of  careful  study  and  trained  judgment. 
His  knowledge  had  not  come  to  him  out  of 
the  air.  He  had  earned  it  by  sleeping  but 
144 


MILES    POINDEXTER 

five  hours  each  night  and  making  use  of 
the  other  hours  of  darkness  in  reading 
classics,  history,  fiction,  philosophy  —  to 
him  everything  was  grist  for  his  mental 
mill.  His  knowledge  is  encyclopaedic. 

He  resigned  his  judgeship  to  enter  the 
congressional  campaign  when  the  congres- 
sional place  was  made  vacant  by  the  ele- 
vation of  Wesley  L.  Jones  to  the  United 
States  Senate.  There  were  a  number  of 
aspirants.  Six  or  seven  of  them  spent 
most  of  their  time  trying  to  win  the  sup- 
port of  Frank  Post,  attorney  for  the  big 
corporations,  who  was  commonly  reported 
as  a  man  of  political  power.  Poindexter 
took  the  opposite  tack.  He  sent  some 
of  Post's  friends  around  to  him  to  per- 
suade him  to  announce  himself  opposed 
to  Poindexter.  That  showed  the  people 
that  Poindexter  was  not  looking  for  the 
friendship  of  the  corporations. 
145 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

Poindexter's  strength  consists  in  his 
honesty,  straightforwardness,  courage  of 
conviction,  equipment  of  basic  knowledge, 
convincing  sincerity,  and  his  dogged  and 
persistent  policy  of  doing  what  seems  to 
him  to  be  the  right  thing  for  the  good  of 
the  greater  number.  In  his  campaign  he 
travels  on  horseback  over  his  district  and 
talks  man  to  man  with  the  voters.  He  im- 
presses them  with  the  fact  that  he  is  one 
of  them  —  anyhow,  it  is  certain  that  his 
personal  power  put  to  rout  six  of  his 
opponents. 

Oratory  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  equip- 
ment of  this  insurgent.  But  what  he  lacks 
in  fieriness  and  dramatic  power  he  makes 
up  in  clearness,  conciseness,  logic,  and 
earnest  sincerity.  He  speaks  just  as  he 
thinks.  Unlike  many  another  good  poli- 
tician, he  has  no  machine.  He  realizes 
that  to  construct  a  strong  political  ma- 
146 


MILES    POINDEXTER 

chine  promises  and  pap  must  be  given  to 
hangers-on.  He  goes  without  a  machine 
by  resting  his  case  with  the  people  them- 
selves. He  is  reported  to  be  his  own 
manager  and  board  of  strategy.  In  his 
campaigns  he  seems  to  have  no  secrets. 
He  evades  nothing.  Those  in  doubt  can 
find  out  where  he  stands  by  asking  him. 

Like  Norris  and  LaFollette,  his  home 
life  is  as  clear  as  a  crystal.  He  has  no 
money  to  spend  in  living  a  gay  life,  nor, 
were  he  possessed  of  great  wealth,  has  he 
the  desire  to  live  otherwise  than  as  he  does. 
He  lives  on  the  outermost  edge  of  Spo- 
kane, on  a  little  farm.  His  home  is  filled 
with  books.  When  at  home,  he  milks  his 
own  cow,  feeds  his  own  chickens  —  lives 
like  any  sane  man  who  loves  to  recreate 
himself  by  living  close  to  the  soil. 

This  man  is  not  a  lover  of  fighting.  But 
when  there  is  a  fight  to  be  fought,  and  he 


HEROES    OF    INSURGENCY 

is  -needed  in  it,  he  is  there  with  all  the 
power  of  brain  and  body.  He  is  blessed 
with  the  far-famed  Southern  nerve.  It 
required  nerve  of  the  purest  kind  for  the 
fight  he  waged  as  the  first  Western  insur- 
gent. It  has  taken  nerve  all  through  the 
strenuous  congressional  days.  The  other 
members  of  the  Washington  delegation, 
while  liking  Poindexter  personally,  were 
wholly  out  of  sympathy  with  him  in  his 
insurging.  But  Poindexter  has  asked 
neither  favors  nor  quarter  and  has  gone 
forward  doing  his  duty  as  he  under- 
stands it. 

He  stands  with  Pinchot  on  the  conser- 
vation question,  and  believes  that  Roose- 
velt is  the  man  needed  to  help  the  people 
win  their  battle  against  that  entrenched 
power  which  Cannon  represents  in  the 
House  and  which  Aldrich  represents  in  the 

Senate. 

148 


MILES    POINDEXTER 

In  his  senatorial  campaign  his  platform 
contained  three  planks:  amendment  of 
the  tariff  laws  to  reduce  the  cost  of  living ; 
support  of  the  Pinchot  policy  toward  con- 
servation of  national  resources,  and  the 
enactment  of  such  national  legislation  as 
the  "  drys  "  have  requested.  On  the  latter 
he  argues  that  the  smaller  centers  of  popu- 
lation and  the  rural  districts  should  be  free 
to  choose  whether  they  will  permit  the 
entry  of  liquor. 

Poindexter  is  one  of  the  great  men  of 
the  Far  West.  His  place,  whether  he  wins 
or  loses  in  his  fights  for  office,  will  ever 
be  one  which  accords  with  the  philosophy 
of  the  square  deal. 


149 


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